Application for an excavation permit according to § 11 (1) Austrian Monuments Protection Law for a surface survey (2017)
To establish whether the Austrian National Heritage Agency (BDA) correctly applies the law, an excavation permit according to § 11 (1) DMSG was applied for in April 2017 for a surface survey for the collection of surface finds in my parents' garden in Vienna. The permit issued by the BDA was the successfully challenged before the Austrian Federal Administrative Court of Appeals (BVwG). The BVwG found, as I had argued to the BDA from the start, that the BDA was prohibited from issuing permits for surface surveys on non-scheduled sites for a number of reasons, first and foremost because the provisions of § 11 (1) only make excavations and other research in situ to discover monuments beneath the surface of the earth or water subject to a permit issued by the BDA, which necessarily must exclude surface surveys to discover monuments already on the surface.
The attached materials contain all relevant documents related to this case.