Paths to the Past. Designing Equipment for Sustainable Management and a Culturally Aware Fruition of the Site

The text briefly goes over the criteria that guided the planning of the equipment and the laying out of the archaeological park of Tilmen Höyük, with the aim of offering long-term sustainable and culturally aware visitor enjoyment. The text also includes graphical documentation of each item. Environmental, economic and technical sustainability was the main objective pursued in our planning of accesses to the park (both new and extant ones), visitor paths, resting spots, and the protective structure designated as K-5 built to shelter valuable vestiges of buildings made of mudbrick, a material that is vulnerable to the aggression of time. The materials chosen for the new equipment are almost exclusively natural. They include wood for path railings, benches, the protective roofing, and marking out the sloping paths; local rock (basalt) for the base blocks of benches and didactic panels, with a direct conceptual link to the foundation blocks of the Royal Palace on the acropolis and the intriguing steles wedged in the ground at the archaeological site of Yesemek, in the same valley. We devoted special care to the planning of the protective structure over area K-5. We began with a broad examination of cases and the construction of a database. This database is searchable by parts and by problems, such as the best spacing for supports, ground anchoring, interference with archaeological vestiges, the morphology of the structure and its impact on visual perception, environmental impact of the material used for the roofing and its possible consequences for the local microclimate and the conservation of the archaeological vestiges, building flexibility, and possible reversibility. Its building simplicity, limited impact on the environment and skyline of the site, ease of maintenance, and incorporation of traditional building methods, along with a didactic communication project, can make this project a 'model' applicable to other sites, as well as an interesting experience in transdisciplinary work.