Date

1978

Author

Alsac, Orhan

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Regarding the issue of conservation, the first Turkish planning act of the 1930's contained limited provisions only for single buildings or monuments proper. The listing of buildings to be preserved was a task entrusted to the Ministry of National Education. A standard distance of 10 metres was left around the listed buildings, regardless of their individual peculiarities, and no new construction was permitted within this distance. It was soon realized, however, that this standard distance could indeed be too small for a large edifice and too out-of-scale in the case of small structures such as street fountains. Furthermore, it was totally incomprehensible to insist on the legal 10 metre protection-zone for each building in say a row of houses which were found worth preserving. These inconveniences were rectified to a great extent in later planning regulations by introducing provisions for the relaxation of the 10 metre rule at the discretion of the Supreme Council of Historic Buildings and Monuments. The establishment of the Council, in 1951, was perhaps the most important single factor in introducing the new provisions. The legislators had little hesitation in vesting legal authority with an institution the majority of whose members were University professors with but an academic and scientific interest in the matter. Nevertheless, the authority of the Council was questioned, even though occasionally, when property ownership and redevelopment rights of individuals were restricted in pursuit of the preservation objectives of planning proposals. There were often cases too of the relaxation of former restrictions upon the Council's decisions. The development in 1960's of the idea of conservation of historic urban environment instead of the- former practice of preserving single monuments necessitated first the, amendement of the planning law and, later, the enactment of the still current monuments and historic buildings law in 1973. Under new legislation the Council, drawing also from the experience of the past 28 years of its existence, often deemed it essential to revoke planning decisions in force and to call for "hew proposals more in compliance with conservation requirements. This has eventually led to a new concept of conservation planning the principles of which may be outlined as: \ r 1- Planning proposals should promote conservation with a view to keeping urban densities within reasonable limits; 2- Planning proposals should be carefully studied beforehand so as not to isolate conservation areas from the rest of the towns or cities; ! 3- Transportation and traffic within and without conservation areas should be tediously worked out and people living in such areas should never be deprived of adequate transportation; 4- Conservation planning should also be indicative of the respect and public interest in the area to be conserved; 5- Conservation plans should include all detailed conservation decisions, not only in respect to monuments proper and other major edifices but also for more modest elements, all curtilages, and streetscapes that go into the making of the total character of the area; 6- The final principle is that the conservation plan should promote public consciousness in its objectives. It is imperative in this connexion that the planner himself should first of all have a lively and genuine interest in what he is doing and that no conservation scheme could ever be realized without the full participation of the public.

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http://jfa.arch.metu.edu.tr/archive/0258-5316/1978/cilt04/sayi_2/195-200.pdf
https://hdl.handle.net/11511/51238

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Department of Architecture, Article