Cultural Landscape Report for Hampton National Historic Site, Volume II: Treatment and Record of Treatment

Beagan, Christopher

The National Park Service uses cultural landscape reports as the primary tool to inform treatment and long-term management decisions regarding cultural landscapes. As an element of a cultural landscape report, the treatment volume establishes site-specific guidelines for preserving and enhancing historic landscapes’ characteristics and features. This guidance is presented within the context of the landscape’s significance, existing conditions, as well as current and proposed uses. This methodology is consistent with A Guide to Cultural Landscape Reports: Content, Process, and Techniques, which outlines the purpose, process, content, and format of the cultural landscape report. This report is organized into four chapters. The first chapter establishes a framework for treatment based on the park’s enabling legislation, National Register of Historic Places documentation, General Management Plan and Environmental Impact Statement, Long-Range Interpretive Plan, and the findings of the Cultural Landscape Report for Hampton National Historic Site, Vol. I: Site History, Existing Conditions, Analysis and Evaluation and draft Cultural Landscape Report for Hampton National Historic Site, Vol. II: Treatment Plan. This framework articulates a treatment philosophy that describes the desired character of the landscape, establishes a primary treatment approach for the landscape, and identifies a treatment reference date as a benchmark for assessing historic character. Based on this treatment framework, the second chapter of this report describes general treatment recommendations that address broad issues impacting the historic character of the landscape. The third chapter describes specific treatment tasks necessary to enhance the historic character of the landscape while accommodating contemporary site management needs. The fourth chapter includes a summary discussion of implementation considerations, including a table that recommends practical priorities and considerations related to facility management. The report concludes with a record of treatment completed for the Falling Gardens. The general treatment recommendations and specific treatment tasks included in this report were developed in collaboration with park staff during a workshop held at Hampton National Historic Site on January 12, 2012. During the treatment workshop the team discussed recommendations based on an analysis of resource integrity, directives and goals expressed in existing planning documents, as well as previously unidentified park needs. Follow-up site visits with discussion of preliminary recommendations were completed on May 23–25, 2012 and August 21, 2013. This report recommends and describes all landscape treatment at the conceptual level. Further planning, design, and compliance will be required for implementation of many of the recommendations. Chapter four of this report details the relationship between treatment recommendations and the National Park Service Facility Management Software System (FMSS) in an effort to facilitate translation of recommendations into project funding requests. The majority of these recommendations are related to addressing deferred maintenance, new construction, or improving universal accessibility. This report does not address recurring and cyclical maintenance tasks, such as weeding and tree pruning, that are necessary in daily operation of the park and to perpetuate the historic character of the landscape. These types of recommendations are typically addressed in a preservation maintenance plan.

Cultural Landscape Report for Hampton National Historic Site, Volume II: Treatment and Record of Treatment

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