The Beirut Port explosion on August 4, 2020, was a watershed event in the history of Lebanon, and the capital city Beirut.  The Declaration was launched on 10 August 2020 with the participation of the Order of Engineers and Architects (OEA) in Beirut, in partnership with the Faculties of Architecture in Lebanon, Chadirji Foundation for Architecture and Society, Architects Association – Beirut, and the Urban Planners Association – Beirut.

This declaration reviews a set of ideas that would constitute a starting point for work, to formulate an integrated vision for the reconstruction of the affected areas, as a result of the port explosion. It proposes a national vision for reconstruction, heritage rehabilitation, protection of the social fabric, and the distinguished urban identity in the affected area as a result of the tragic event, and the reformulation of the port relationship and its urban context.

The declaration is an intellectual and cultural endeavor that contributes to the formulation of a comprehensive vision, in form of ideas and proposals of the reformation of the city. It presents them as a set of documented issues that seek to meet the challenges of emptying the city from its residents and demography change, as well as providing suggestions and quick feasible, and operational ideas to the officials and official institutions concerned.

The declaration outlines the course of intervention and the role that the OEA could play in cooperation with the Universities in envisioning the reformation of the affected region. It adopts a comprehensive view of social, economical, and urban aspects, and deals with the damaged area as an urban fabric fully integrated with the port.

Beirut Urban Declaration” emphasizes on preserving the heritage urban fabric, which consists of their general fabric and the constituent units of this tissue, and as a site in which people’s life, social and economic behavior is practiced. Considering the heritage character of the affected area, determining the paths between urgent (fast), medium, and long term (slow), and establishing an observatory. Finally, the need to establish appropriate policies and a reconstruction management that has to go through devising mechanisms that guarantee wide participation of the society and specialists.

"Beirut Urban Declaration" is divided into five axes, namely:

1. City Identity
2. Economic and Social Consequences
3. Towards a Comprehensive View of Rehabilitating the Destroyed Area
4. Challenges of Protecting and Rehabilitating the Urban Heritage Fabric
5. Management and Organization of Planning and Reconstruction

Proposed Recommendations:

• Develop a national vision for reconstruction, heritage rehabilitation, protection of the social fabric, and the distinguished urban identity in the affected area.
• Form a supportive and impartial advisory committee at the initiative of the Directorate General of Antiquities to supervise studies, provide advice and professional advice, follow up the implementation of emergency works, and rationalize and control their financing.
• Establish an independent body to manage and preserve the living urban heritage, under the supervision of the Ministry of Culture. The Commission aims to preserve cities, regions, historical monuments, local and traditional heritage areas, and their tangible and intangible heritage, and urbanism with all its elements, vocabulary, crafts and traditional building materials associated therewith.
• Issue laws and regulations necessary to preserve cities and historical monuments from human attacks and natural deterioration, in coordination and cooperation with various competent authorities.
• Prepare a guide with specifications, controls and conditions related to construction, restoration, maintenance, rebuilding and rehabilitation works in registered sites and historical cities.
• Exiting the concept of the rentier relationship with the heritage areas as a real estate reserve for the construction trade.
• Adopt the system of special heritage areas and heritage reserves at the rural and city levels, and update the building system, subject to the conditions of the special heritage area.
• Management and organization of planning and reconstruction (Establishment of the Urban Observatory).
• Proposal to establish a permanent observatory for urban issues in the Order of Engineers and Architects under the supervision of an advisory committee from the faculties of architecture, the architectural scientific associations and the partner architectural societies of the Order of Engineers and Architects.

General Recommendations:

• Establish the organizing body subject to the urban heritage management, in coordination with the relevant international national authorities and funds and the responsibility to support its preservation and development. The Authority, in coordination with the competent authorities, shall develop plans for the economic development of the registered sites.
• Determine the areas and topics of investment and securing financing, and the process of partnership between sectors (public and private).
• Emphasize the necessity of implementing the plan and the comprehensive vision for the management of the reconstruction of the city of Beirut proposed within the Beirut Urban Declaration in all its axes.
• Emphasize on devising process to involve all stakeholders in the decision in line with the public interest of the community and the city.
• Emphasize on the formation of a central administration of stakeholders and financiers with the involvement of a neutral financial audit committee to oversee the reconstruction.
• Emphasize the need to establish a professional, specialized and transparent administration to manage the port of Beirut in order to restore it to its leading role in the Mediterranean navigation.
• Establish a training and disaster management center.
• Emphasize the need to review laws that have negative effects on the public interest.

Academics and specialists participating in the discussion and preparation of the Beirut Urban Declaration