Mitteilungen des Österreichischen Staatsarchivs 39. (1986)
Archive Buildings and the Conservation of Archival Material. An Expert Meeting, held in Vienna, Austria October 30 - November 1, 1985 - BUCHMANN, Wolf: Planning an Archive Building. The Cooperation between Architect and Archivist
Planning an Archive Building 205 2 Even if the need for a new building is evident to the archivist, he will have to convince the political authorities. The arguments he can use are: the lack of repositories, laboratories, office rooms or rooms open to the public (for example research rooms or exhibition halls) can be pointed out; the importance of an archivist’s work for the public on one hand and for government and the administration on the other hand might be emphasized. Here we might refer to the responsibility of an archive for the preservation of the national cultural heritage and its presentation in an adequate building; looking at the growing tasks and responsibilities of an archive with limited staff, a new building can offer the possibility of rationalizing the work of the archivist; new technical developments might require new archival facilities, only available in new buildings; new tasks might lead to new needs for an archive building. For the discussions in which these arguments are to be used, detailed statistics have to be worked out, these include statistics about the holdings already housed in the repositories of an archive, the records in the record centres and the records in the agencies; as well as statistics about researchers, about the work done in the laboratories or about visitors to archival exhibitions. All these figures and arguments have to be ascertained and thought over very carefully, because at a later stage they will be used as basic data by the architect when planning the building. These arguments and figures then have to be streamlined. Even in this preliminary phase a clear decision has to be made about the archivist in charge of all matters concerning the new building. This responsibility should be given to one archivist who should report directly to the head of the archives. He should be the sole person, to be contacted by others, including the architect, and be responsible for coordinating the planning within the archives. 3 3.1 The space necessary in the new building has to be evaluated for every room. According to the regulations in the Federal Republic of Germany, this will lead to a list of these rooms in a standardized form with information about:
