Measuring Learning Outcomes in Museums,Archives and Libraries: The Learning Impact Research Project (LIRP)

There has been legislation in place since the 1970s in Canada's largest province, Ontario, that encourages the identification of significant heritage buildings and is supposed to provide them with at least a degree of protection. Both heritage recognition and most other land use decisions, however, are exercised at the local government level. W'hile conservation of heritage structures has been successful in some places, an alarming number of significant historic buildings in the province continue to be lost. Relying on dozens of volunteers, this study examined thousands of buildings in over twenty Ontario communities and sought to establish how many heritage buildings had been demolished and to determine why these losses were occurring. It was discovered that in the municipalities surveyed over 400 historically recognised buildings had been lost in the last sixteen years. Recommendations for how to deal with this problem are included in the study.