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Historic buildings still perform their role today by being utilized either for their original purpose or a new purpose for which they are adapted. These buildings have specific requirements that inhabitants must follow. These requirements and relating uses and maintenance procedures result from adaptive reuse decisions, which may not be the most optimal scenario. The imperative is that historic buildings are used in a manner that, on the one hand, does not endanger their value related to heritage and tradition, and on the other hand, guarantees a degree of utility for their inhabitants, such as acceptable performance with regards to either air cooling or heating. The challenge is how to optimize the use of energy for either air cooling or heating, provided that adaptive reuse decisions are grounded in certain very specific and very rigid principles. The latter render is extremely difficult to meet the twin challenges of ensuring energy efficiency and thermal comfort for inhabitants while at the same time complying with the adaptive reuse principles. To address this challenge and gain an insight into ways of navigating it, a Post Occupancy Evaluation (POE) is conducted in Former Soldier’s Residence in the Cairo Citadel, Cairo, Egypt, which is now used as the National Organization for Urban Harmony’s (NOUH) administrative head office, this research can be considered as a single domain from which many other possible multi-domains can be investigated while studying the case of adaptive reuse. Other aspects such as indoor environmental quality, air quality, acoustics and lighting might act as multiple approaches appear to be widely used according to this review study, and in the future, the authors intend to test this research with the current single approach used in this research, which is the thermal comfort. POE includes both objective and subjective assessment, the POE limitation at this research to those assessment while a multi-perceptional and behavioral factors might be used as physical, contextual, personal, and others. The simulation and the survey methods were employed consecutively to assess the case study. By considering the research results, it was determined that the building consumes unnecessary energy by its current use of air conditioning system.

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The Heritage Gardens are a very important urban component in Egyptians' lives, from ancient times until now. In the modern era, a lot of very important and famous gardens have been established in Egypt, especially by Mohamed Ali Pasha and Khedive Ismail (1830-1895). Most of these gardens have been listed as Heritage Gardens by the National Organization for Urban Harmony (NOUH), but because of the shortage of data, the conservation process could not be completed.The Heritage Gardens have deteriorated over time. They were built as privet gardens, palace gardens or public gardens.One of the most unique gardens in Cairo is the Fish Garden and Grotto, which was established in 1867 as a privet garden for the royal family. It was turned into a public garden in 1902.Because 3D laser scanning is considered an initial tool for documenting the huge and important Heritage Gardens in Egypt, this paper presents the technique of preparing a full, detailed documentation for sites and open spaces by the 3D laser scanner. It will prepare a high level of documentation, especially for the Heritage Grotto. The project takes eight weeks on-site and four weeks in-office to complete the documentation to finish the Fish Garden and Grotto (total area 10 feddan) from both the outside and the inside.To reach the goal of the paper, the research goes through the historical background to present the importance of the garden as a Heritage Garden, as well as to show the importance of this garden in the local community. Then, the paper presents the documentation technique by using the 3D laser scanner and a sample of the outcomes to confirm the importance of using the 3D laser scanning as a revolutionary technology in the fields of cultural heritage and landscape site documentation.

The Khedivial Cairo is the central part of Downtown Cairo, it was planned and designed by prestigious French architects who were commissioned by Khedive Ismail, who stressed the importance of European style urban planning in Cairo, to include broad, linear gridded streets, geometric harmony, and modern European architectural style.Since the 1860th tell now Khedivial Cairo has had significant importance as downtown and a heritage area. But after decades of neglecting the heritage buildings in downtown, without any maintenance and a lot of unprofessional additions to them, all the heritage buildings in this area need to be restored.The revitalization project of the Khedivial Cairo started a few years ago, as cooperation between many governmental ministries, the privet sector, and the stakeholders. But the project still missed the comprehensive master plan for the whole area. This paper will present overview of the revitalization of Khedivial Cairo project, in addition to discuss a case study of the restoration of a building in Kasr Elnil street and the work difficulties, attempts to find solutions and development of responses to these difficulties, these solutions should preserve the identity of the heritage building.

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This study aims to monitor the magnitudes, rates, and directions of spatial urban expansions east of Cairo and their interactions with the initial morphologic landscapes. The approach relies on using CORONA satellite images acquired in 1969 with fine spatial resolution and time series images of Landsat and ASTER from 1984 to 2020. The CORONA images enable retrieval of the initial morphologic components, whereas the Landsat and ASTER images enable the spatial urban expansions to be mapped. The magnitudes of spatial urban expansions have been massive, in the order of 165 km2. These expansions have occurred through four main temporal phases with different spatial extents, rates, and directions in response to common urban policies and socioeconomic settings. Assessing the interactions between urban expansions and the morphology of watersheds in the study area indicates that the directions of urban expansion have been opposite to the geospatial orientations of the watersheds. In addition, significant urban areas in the order of ~8 km2 are under the direct threat of flash floods because they are misplaced within the valley floors of the studied watersheds. The study concludes that successful spatial urban expansion should consider the morphologic characteristics of the initial landscape for the purpose of maximizing interests and avoiding or reducing potential hazards against urban settlements.

The project of the New Gourna by Hassan Fathy in Egypt (1946Egypt ( -1952) considered as an outstanding example of sustainable human settlement and appropriate use of technology in architecture and planning, it also inspired a new generation of architects and planners worldwide through an integration of vernacular technology with modern architectural principles. But through decades of lack of maintenance and neglect, the New Gourna faced severe structural problems and demolishes. This paper focused on the series of efforts that had been done to reach the real project of Safeguard Hassan Fathy architectural legacy in New Gourna 2021, with the proposed work plan of conservation and reuse the heritage public buildings of New Gourna, with a comprehensive sustainable solution to the main problem that threatens the project which is the underground water.The study suggested that a maintenance plan must be established for the new system of the underground water, to avoid any leaking or plugging of the connecting pipes that could affect the level of water under the foundations.The restored buildings also must have a regular maintenance plan, and also must be reused and engaged with the community needs to encourage them to safeguard the heritage buildings and stop sabotaging them.