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Planning, Legislation and Implementation Problems of Green Spaces in the Case of Antalya City, Turkey

Veli Ortacesme 1


Dr. Veli ORTACESME

Department of Landscape Architecture Akdeniz University, [email protected]

Phone: +90-242-3102477, Fax: +90-242-2274564

Abstract

Urbanization played a significant role in the second half of the 20th century in Turkey. Immigration from rural areas to cities created many problems including green space problems. Municipalities with competence concerning urban planning and management have been unable to provide sufficient open and green spaces for city dwellers. This is true even for the tourist regions of the country. The City of Antalya, located in the Mediterranean coasts, is one of the rapidly growing cities in Turkey as a result of developments in tourism sector in the last two decades. The employment opportunities by tourism investments attracted many people seeking a job to the city. As the urban infrastructure improved, immigration from other parts of Turkey also increased. The rich natural and cultural values of the city played an important role in this immigration. The number of arriving tourists was also gradually increased. In 2004, Antalya received some 6.5 million tourists, equivalent to the 30-35 % of tourists visited Turkey in that year. Open and green spaces have undergone a high pressure in that urbanization process. The results of a recent survey revealed various problems related with open and green spaces in the city. Per capita green space in the city was found 4.4 m², which is a very low figure compared with many European cities, but still higher than some major Turkish cities such as Istanbul and Ankara. Among the reasons of the shortage of open and green are: rapid urbanization associated with immigration, legal gaps, insufficient planning approaches, management problems, etc. In this article, green space problems of Turkish cities will be discussed from legislation, planning and implementation viewpoints in the case of Antalya city. Keywords: Urbanization; Green Space; Planning; Legislation; Antalya; Turkey;

Introduction The 20th century has experienced the greatest urban expansion in human history, with most of the population shift taking place in the second half. Between 1950-85, the number of people living in cities almost tripled, increasing by 1.25 million. In developed countries, the urban population nearly doubled, from 450 million to 840 million, while in the developing world, it quadrupled from 285 million to 1.5 billion. Moreover, a significant proportion of the urban population is concentrated in metropolitan regions of enormous size. The tendency of concentration in large metropolitan areas is predominant in developing countries. The main factor behind this transformation is the general population boom of the 20th century and the rapid economic growth which is typically associated with a decline in the share of agriculture in economic activities and increased share of the industrial and service sectors, the latter are mostly concentrated in urban centrums (United Nations, 1991). Turkey is a developing country and everything mentioned above concerning the developing countries are true for Turkey too. Industrialization and migration to cities have increased in the country, especially from the 1950 onwards. The urban population was around 5.2 million in 1950 and it reached to 44 million in 2000 which represents a nine times increase in 50 years. The share of urban population in total population was changing between 23-25 % before 1950, but it increased continuously after then and reached to 65 % in 2000 (DIE, 2002). It is expected to be near 70 % by the year 2010 (Gultekin & Ortacesme, 1996). In industrialized countries, the reflection of urbanisation on outdoor environments has been in the form of a positive development while in developing countries like Turkey where the industrialization has followed urbanization, it has been awry (Keles, 1997). In this process, urban cultural resources, open and green spaces have undergone an important pressure.


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Urban open and green spaces have many physical, ecological and social functions. Among them are the provision of circulation between different urban land uses, contribution to the physical comfort of city dwellers, increasing aesthetical value of the environment, provision of recreation opportunities, formation of habitats for plant and animal species, reduction of noise and air pollution and so on. To be able to provide all these contributions, they need to be planned with a system approach in urban planning process (Ortacesme et al, 2000) Social planners and sociologists have stressed the importance of public open spaces in daily life. They view each public open space in terms of its symbolic and cultural aspects and emphasize the difference between life-cycles (age, family structure, employment) and social groups (income, education, profession). For young people especially, public open spaces open up a much wider range of social and communicational experiences than is possible in private and institutionalized places (Grimm-Pretner, 2004). Open and green spaces like community gardens affect not only the lived experience of their participants but also have an undeniable effect on city’s politics. The gardens are much more than the sum of their soil and vegetation. They are sites through which many social, economic, cultural and political concerns, especially of underprivileged urban residents, are channelled, articulated and brought forth to the public sphere (Eizenberg, 2004). Provision of urban open spaces is a central issue in urban planning and development. However, it has been in long-term decline due to local government rationalization of spending and services; with development pressure come issues such as traffic congestion, air pollution, shortage of housing, insufficient social facilities and lack of recreational and urban open spaces. Green spaces have been regarded as least important aspects of land use in urban planning on one hand, but have received significant attention from the public (Melasutra, 2004). Provision of urban green spaces has to be planned and realised together with the planning of other urban functions like housing, transport, infrastructure, etc. The process of urban green planning must be seen as one part of an integrated overall city planning process where the implementation of the strategy becomes easier because it is accepted both by the municipality administration and the citizens. The challenges cities will face in the near future are likely to place greater emphasis on the multiple roles of green spaces, especially regarding the expectations of citizens regarding the quality of life. This will require robust ideas for strategies and places considerable demands for improved national and European green space policies (Coles & Grayson, 2004).

Legislation and Common Practice concerning Urban Green Spaces in Turkey Main legislation concerning urban planning in Turkey is the Construction Law and its regulation. This legislation includes foresights for urban land uses including green spaces. Within the historical development of the legislation, the common approach towards urban green space planning has been to provide certain amount (m²) of green space per capita of the projected population. The first standard was brought by the former Construction Law of 6785, adopted in 1956. An article concerning the provision of at least 7 m² green spaces per capita in urban areas was added to the regulation of the law in 1972. However, any other specification had not been made concerning the character of green spaces to be planned. It was not clear whether they would be parks and gardens open to public use or they would include forest and agricultural field with passive green character. The implementation of the law in the following three decades didn’t produce satisfactory results. Planners tended to include all types of green spaces, whether they are open to public or not, when meeting the 7 m² standard. The consequence, associated with the rapid urban population increase due to immigrations in between 1956-85, was cities poor in open and green spaces. The 7 m² standard was maintained in the actual Construction Law of 3194, adopted in 1985. The regulation of the Construction Law of 3194 was also made specific definition of green spaces to be considered when fulfilling 7 m² standards. They should be “active green space” such as parks, children playgrounds and sport fields with necessary facilities and open to public use. However, there were still no foresights for urban green space planning such as formation of a green structure, delimitation of urban growth by green belts, provision of evenly distribution of the green spaces in urban texture, etc. The per capita green space was increased to 10 m² by a regulation revision after the heavy earthquake in the Marmara Region of Turkey in 1999. The reason of that increase was the sad experience gained during and after the earthquake. There were no sufficient free spaces for the people to take refuge during the earthquake and to set up tents afterwards in the devastated towns and cities. The lack of sufficient legal framework for urban green space planning in the existing legislation has led to poor green structure in Turkish cities. Municipal administrations not tended to allocate valuable urban lands in monetary terms as open and green spaces. Today, general approach in the urban structural planning is the allocation of informal lots, which are not suitable for building constructions, as green spaces. Very little attention is paid to the evenly distribution of green spaces in cities, hence no balance can be seen in terms of the accessibility within a reasonable walking distance to open and green spaces. The consequences of this approach are very small open and green spaces, randomly distributed in urban texture. There are some other problems concerning the establishment of open and green spaces in Turkish cities. The municipalities with competence on this respect have financial problems for land appropriation for open and green space establishment. Even a piece of land is determined as green space in the urban structural plan, it may


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not be established unless it is appropriated in a certain time and the owner of the land is paid. The municipalities also lack of professional and technical staff for well-designed and managed open and green spaces. For that reason, there is also a quality problem in the existing open and green spaces. As a consequence of legal gaps, financial problems, etc., the majority of Turkish cities lacks of a good quality open and green spaces. The per capita green space is around 2-3 m2 in most of them despite the legal obligation of 10 m2.

Urbanization and Green Space Relations in Antalya City The City of Antalya is located in the Mediterranean Region of Turkey (Figure 1). It is one of the 17 metropolitan cities in the country with a population of 604.000, which made it the 8th largest city in terms of population according to the official census in 2000 (Table I). Estimated actual population of the city is around 750.000. It was given metropolitan status in 1994 and has three sub-municipalities, namely Muratpasa, Kepez and Konyaalti. Main sector in the economy of the city is tourism. Antalya is considered the tourism capital of the country due to the fact that one third of the tourists arriving to Turkey come to this city. Figure 1. Location map of Antalya city

Table I. Development of Urban Population in Antalya City since 1950 (DIE, 2002).

Census Year Population Annual Increase Rate (‰) 1950 27.515 9.90 1955 35.283 28.23 1960 50.908 44.28 1965 71.833 41.10 1970 95.616 33.10 1975 130.774 36.77 1980 173.501 32.67 1985 261.114 50.49 1990 378.208 44.84 2000 604.000 44.13

2005* 749.536* 44.13 *) Projection by the author


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Antalya city and surroundings were mainly living from the agriculture until 1980s. It was one of the leading citrus production regions of Turkey. The city was a medium sized one at that time. In 1982, the Tourism Incentives Law passed through the Turkish Parliament and Antalya started to become a favourite place for investors due to its rich natural and cultural assets, clean and beautiful coasts, historical ruins and mild climate. Many big hotels and holiday villages were constructed along the coasts. As the employment opportunities increased, immigration from the rural regions of Turkey was started. The infrastructures of the city have been improved in accordance with tourism investments and Antalya has also become a favorite living place for Turkish citizens, especially for retired persons, living in the other cities of the country. They tended to buy a second house in the city for living especially during the summer months. As the tourism infrastructures improved, Antalya has also become a destination for tourists, mainly for European tourists. The number of arriving tourists was dramatically increased from 1.9 million in 1995 to 6.7 in 2004, which represents four times increase in ten years period. It is expected that some 7.5 million tourists visit Antalya in 2005 (Table II). Table II. Tourist arriving to Antalya and Turkey between 1995 and 2005 (DIE, 2005; Antalya Valiligi, 2005)

Number of tourists arriving to Year Turkey Antalya

Share of Antalya (%)

1995 7 747389 1 891 537 24.4 1996 8 536 778 2 541 117 29.8 1997 9 712 510 2 862 719 29.5 1998 9 431 280 2 539 442 26.9 1999 7 485 308 1 824 420 24.4 2000 10 428 153 3 234 457 31.0 2001 11 619 909 4 333 127 37.3 2002 13 248 176 4 937 773 37.3 2003 13 956 405 4 888 012 35.0 2004 17 548 384 6 759 635 38.5 2005 20 000 000* 7.500.000* 37.5*

*) Estimation Limited data is available on open and green space developments in this process. However, it is known that many agricultural fields, particularly citrus orchards were transformed into building lots. Until present, four structural plans (in 1957, 1969, 1977 and 1995) were prepared for the city. Since green space standards were included into Turkish legislation in 1972 for the first time, it can be said that there were no standards for planners to be followed when preparing the first two structural plans of the city. There is no data concerning the green space approach of the 1977 structural plan either. The most comprehensive green space consideration is seen in the 1995 plan. The tourism character of the city was taken into consideration and appropriate planning approaches were developed. Per capita green space was planned as 11.67 m² (Dampo, 2004). Meanwhile, the first survey on the existing urban green spaces in Antalya city was done by Ortacesme et al. (2000). Numerical data from their study was given in the following table. Table III. Data related to Active Green Spaces in Antalya City (Ortacesme et al., 2000)

Muratpasa Municipality

Kepez Municipality

Konyaalti Municipality

Metropolitan City (Total)

Number of active green spaces 84 91 25 200

Total surface (m²) 911.980 715.700 74.460 1.702.140

Projected population in 1999* 281.653* 247.439* 24.448* 553.540*

Per capita active green space (m²) 3.2 2.9 3.0 3.1

Number of quarters 56 51 24 131

Number of quarters with green spaces 29 37 11 77

Rate of quarters with green spaces (%) 51 72 45 59 *) Projection by the authors


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As can be seen from the Table III, a total of 200 active green spaces were found in Antalya Metropolitan City. Total surface represented by these spaces was 1.702.140 m². Per capita active green space in the Metropolitan City was found 3.1 m². The average size of the green spaces was 8.510 m². However, when a few large urban parks and zoo let alone, the average size of green spaces was reduced to 2.400 m². The 59 % of city quarters were having at least one active green space. When active green spaces were studied on the basis of each sub-municipality, it could have been appreciated that the amount of per capita active green space was very close to each other. However, this was not true in terms of the distribution of these spaces. While 72 % of the quarters in Kepez Municipality were having at least one active green space, this rate was 51 % and 45 % for Muratpasa and Konyaalti Municipalities, respectively. A similar survey of green spaces of the city has recently been done by the same authors (Table IV). Table IV. Data related to Active Green Spaces in Antalya City in 2005.

Muratpasa Municipality

Kepez Municipality

Konyaalti Municipality

Metropolitan City (Total)

Number of active green spaces 171 164 56 391

Total surface (m²) 1.130.407 1.887.770 271.679 3.289.856

Projected population in 2005 376.865* 328.513* 43.183* 748.561*

Per capita active green space (m²) 3.0 5.7 6.3 4.4

Number of quarters 56 51 24 131

Number of quarters with green spaces 35 42 14 91

Rate of quarters with green spaces (%) 63 82 58 69*) Projection by the author These findings show that the number and the total surface of green spaces have almost doubled in the last five years. There has been a significant increase in the per capita amount of green spaces. The number and percentage of quarters with green spaces have also increased. However, there is still a lack of sufficient green space ordered by the legislation in course, which is 10 m2 per capita. Some other problems coming from the planning and implementation of the green spaces were also determined. One of them is the access problem. Local people must be able to access to urban open and green spaces with a reasonable walk. The distance is either measured by meters from the green space (200-800 meters) or walking time (10-15 minutes walking) A recent study by Manavoglu (2005) on the Konyaalti sub-municipality area revealed that inhabitants of some parts of the urban area are not able to access to the existing green spaces with a reasonable walk (Figure 2). Figure 2. Access Zones of the Existing Green Spaces in Konyaalti Urban Area (Manavoglu, 2005).

SERVICE CIRCLE

0 800 1600 2400m eter

LEG END

N


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Attitudes of Turkish People to Open and Green Spaces Traditionally, Turks are the lovers of nature, plants and flowers. The role of Islamic religion is important in this attitude as the Eden in Islam is described as a very beautiful “garden” with flowers, trees, streams etc. In Ottoman period, palace gardens in Istanbul were surrounded by large green spaces, open to public during religious festivals. For instance, the Topkapi Palace was having a 700 hectares garden. The garden is now one of the oldest and most frequented urban parks of Istanbul. The sultans also established large picnic sites for the people and there were many large green spaces in the major Ottoman cities such as Istanbul, Bursa and Edirne (Gultekin, 1994). Meanwhile, people were living in their individual houses with gardens. Gardens with wells, ponds, fireplaces, fruit trees, scented bushes and flowers were indispensable in the daily life of Turks. People did not need neighbourhood open and green spaces as they were living in a relatively green environment and in the houses with courtyards. Recreational activities were generally limited to picnic sites, river, lake or sea shores at weekends. However, rapid urbanization and industrialization process changed the structure of cities to a great extent. Particularly, after the 1950s, a continuous immigration from rural areas to the cities, where the employment opportunities are higher, started. Urban population has almost tripled in the last 50 years. The effects of this population increase have been tremendous. Structural plans prepared for various cities became insufficient. Individual houses started to become multi-storey buildings. The suburbs were invaded by the squatter settlement of the poor newcomers. These developments have led to uncontrolled and awry urbanization in Turkish cities. Municipalities and local administrations were unable to control all these developments as they were having many organizational, financial and personnel problems. Rapid and uncontrolled urbanization affected former culture and cultural activities in the cities. The cultural dimension has received less attention in urban planning approaches of Turkish cities. Sometimes new culture has destroyed the old one. There are many examples of this. In Antalya, “tent camps” called “oba”, which were set up along the Konyaalti beach, was an important part of local culture in the past. Local people were hiring temporary tents from the municipal authority for summer season. However, with the urban structural plans, Konyaalti beach was turned to a “beach park” disregarding the traditional way of use of the beach. No more “oba” is allowed in the area at the moment. However, it is still in the memories of local people and talked about very much. Kunzmann (2004) argues that the cultural dimension of spatial development is a key to urban and regional development in Old Europe, and that more imaginative spatial planning and creative governance are required to enhance the cultural dimension in order to maintain the European spirit of cities and regions across the continent. He relates the culture, city and planning and makes notice European, national, regional, urban and community dimensions of culture in spatial planning.

Conclusions Rapid urbanization in Turkey has got various negative implications in the cities. The impacts are still going on as the immigrations continue and the rate of population increase is still high. Cities with sufficient quantity and quality greenery are necessary for environmental quality and quality of life. On this respect, Turkish cities are not in a favourable position. In quantitative terms, green space per capita is very low compared to many European cities. While the legislation in force brought a 10 m² active green space standard, it could not be reached to this figure in any Turkish cities. For instance, Izmir has a per capita active green space of 2.8 m², while Ankara, the capital, and Istanbul were having 2.3 m² and 2.1 m² active green spaces, respectively. Antalya, the tourism capital of the country, has perhaps the highest amount of green space with 4.4 m² per capita. In qualitative terms, the problem is still higher. Many open and green spaces in the cities don’t have sufficient infrastructure. They are also not equipped with quality construction materials. The provision of an urban green structure consisting of green spaces, greenways, natural valleys, streams, planted boulevards, and other linear corridors is an important target in urban green space planning. Many authors have already stated the contributions of a green structure to urban environments and there are very good examples of it in various countries (Nyhuus, 1992; Ahern, 1995; Searns, 1995; Jensen et al., 2000). Green structures in Turkish cities have only been limited to green belts developed to control the urban expansion in a few cities. Most of the problems concerning urban green spaces in the country come from the lack of a comprehensive legal framework. The sole provision of the actual Turkish legislation concerning urban green spaces is a per capita amount for projected population. The legislation neither includes articles which impose the evenly distribution of green spaces in the urban texture nor provides a green space system approach in the urban planning and design process.


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Organizational and financial weaknesses are other negative factors affecting the provision of green spaces. In Turkey, urban planning and implementation competences are in the hand of municipalities. However, their organizational structure is not good. The responsibilities were divided into several departments, acting without coordination in many cases. They also lack of sufficient trained professional and technical personnel for open and green spaces. The finance problem is still higher. Most of the municipalities don’t have enough money to appropriate land for open and green spaces and establish them. They generally prefer to establish small open and green spaces because of the low costs. For that reason, the majority of urban parks and green spaces are generally small in size. Problems concerning good quality open and green spaces in the country are also related with the existence of professionals trained on this field. As a result of the development of landscape architecture profession in Turkey in the last three decades and the increasing interest by other planning and design professions, the number of new and good quality open and green spaces is increasing. Turkey is a candidate country to European Union. Membership negotiations are expected to start in October 2005. Environmental issues are among the priority areas in the negotiations. It is expected that the negotiations become an impulse for taking proper measures in all areas, including urban environments.

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