Advancement and Prospect of Informatized Conservation of Historic Cities in China

Taking the timeline and events as the context, this paper examines the development process of informatization in the conservation of historic cities from two aspects: the evolving demand for historic city conservation and the driving effect of information technology advancement. Through a review of relevant policies and academic literature, six interconnected yet distinct development stages are identified: geographic information surveying and mapping, environmental remote sensing survey, spatiotemporal information management, planning decision-making support, conservation monitoring and evaluation, and adaptive reuse. On this basis, facing the future trends in the conservation, utilization, and inheritance of historic cities, as well as the development and application of information technology, the paper outlines three development prospects: multi-dimensional refined conservation, multi-granular monitoring and evaluation, and multi-scenario adaptive reuse, in the hope of facilitating a transition from informatized to intelligence-driven conservation of historic cities.