ABSTRACT
This chapter forms part of on-going research about the management of British historic cities in the twentieth century. Issues of how to balance planned modernity with the conservation of the character of historic city came to the fore across much of the developed world in the 1960s. In Britain, this was the decade that saw the first explicit legislative recognition of the importance of historic areas through the creation of conservation areas' in the 1967 Civic Amenities Act, following a flurry of activity by government and others on appropriate ways to plan the historic town. The chapter focuses on the 1960s government-sponsored conservation plans for two historic cities, Bath and York, but these are briefly placed in the context provided by their 1940s predecessors. Attention is mainly directed to how the plans conceived the historic city, how much the plans were implemented, although there is some brief discussion about how they were received and their legacies to the cities concerned.
