Engineering Heritage Australia

During the year all Engineering Heritage Australia programs progressed as planned.

Four sites were marked under the Heritage Recognition Program, six Awards of Merit were given, four oral histories were completed under the national Oral History Program and the John Monash Medal was awarded to Carl and Margret Doring at the 2008 Engineers Australia Annual General Meeting in Canberra.

The review of the Heritage Recognition Program was completed at the end of the year and the changes to the program were implemented. The traditional bronze plaque has now been replaced by a 300 mm diameter disc showing the Engineers Australia Coat of Arms and the nature of the recognition award. Larger interpretation panels (typically 1200 mm by 500 mm) will also now form part of the program. This change reflects a more modern approach to the interpretation of sites. The new markers will typically be made of vitreous enamel-on-steel construction which facilitates the use of colour, photographs and text as well as being very robust.

New Engineering Heritage and Conservation Guidelines were published on the Engineers Australia website early in 2009. This modernises and expands this document and enables modular additions to be made as time passes. The document provides guidance to engineers and other professionals who have to deal with engineering heritage sites.

The next major enhancement planned for the EHA web presence is to digitise and publish the nomination documents for the 134 sites already marked under the Heritage Recognition Program since 1984. This is a substantial undertaking which will take several years.

Planning is well under way for the 3rd Australasian Engineering Heritage Conference to be held in Dunedin, New Zealand in November 2009. It is our current practice to run every fourth conference in New Zealand in conjunction with our colleagues in IPENZ.

Entries have been invited for the Colin Crisp Award, which is made every second year and will be presented at the Dunedin conference.

EHA continues to develop its alliances with international organisations with similar objectives in the USA, UK and New Zealand.

Owen Peake
Chair