Streszczenie:

In this paper we propose to look at rural landscape from the perspective of heritage. The issue of landscape is presented in the context of contemporary factors which result from the evolving approach both to the notion of heritage itself and to the rules of its conservation. It was noted that activities which identify not only the natural value of landscape but also its historic, cultural, visual, aesthetic and symbolic values, as well as activities which define a heritage community should become a permanent component of current works on integrated rural development.
Rural landscapes are cultural landscapes emerged as a result of a long interaction of environmental factors with the activities of a community living in a given area. In these landscapes traces of the past can be seen in a form of landscape patterns. Identifying and defining landscape heritage should be an important component of spatial planning processes.
Landscape is shaped on a local scale. In the spatial planning system existing in Poland it is local governments which are the authorities with the largest responsibility over spatial planning. The mere conservation of landscape resources without any measures which aim at planning and managing these resources is not sufficient as an effective management tool. In this paper we propose activities which serve to identify and assess the elements of landscape heritage of a given locality and which may be taken up by a local government interested in building a sense of local identity and creating a bond with the local area.
The observations we present are set against legal solutions introduced with the Law of 24 April 2015 on amending certain laws in connection with strengthening the landscape conservation instruments (Ustawa 2015).