UNESCO’S RECENT SUPPORT FOR ANURADHAPURA, JAFFNA AND KANDY

It was heartening to learn through a broadcast from Paris by our Prime Minister that UNESCO will support our efforts to safeguard the heritage status of Anuradhapura and also to help to professionally establish Jaffna and Kandy as ‘heritage cities’.

- K.LOCANA GUNARATNA

Our ancient capital city of Anuradhapura was originally built as a carefully planned and zoned city. This fact has been clearly recorded in our chronicles. This makes clear that the profession of City Planning was practiced in our ancient past. It appears to have continued later mainly to focus more on the defensive aspects of Urban Planning to deter or reduce the likelihood of wartime damage. The Urban Planning profession was all but lost during the late centuries of European colonial subjugation.

Soon after Independence in 1948, Urban Planning was established with government support through the efforts of Oliver Weerasinghe who was the first Sri Lankan British-qualified Town Planner. He was supported and later succeeded by Neville Gunaratna who later became our first professor of the subject in the University of Moratuwa.