Geç osmanlidan erken cumhuriyete iç bati anadolu'da kentsel yapinin deǧişimi: Manisa, afyon, burdur ve isparta kentleri üzerine karsilastirmali bir inceleme (1)

Abstract

Comprehensive and systematic modernization project in cities connected with ports and railways, particularly in the capital city of Istanbul. The most obvious transformation projection of the Tanzimat reforms in city centers is the emergence of a public center. Public areas as locations of government houses, municipalities, jails, banks, schools, police stations, military posts were located side by side at the new commercial centers. Besides, as a consequence of the socio-economic transformations at the end of the 19th century, production facilities such as workshop, factory, warehouse, management offices, buildings of insurance and banking operations came into picture. Those were located in the vicinity of traditional bazaar, in the new commercial center. In this period, the differentiation in housing was also prominent. Large parts of cities subjected to fires and new settlement areas for immigrants of wars were planned explicitly with modern urban understanding. In the Republican era, executive authorities were determined to modernize in an integral understanding. The central government by legal framework and institutions had the mission of 'building a nation'. For its realization, the space of the country had to be converted into national space. Therefore, there necessitated urban master arrangements in a Western sense. Being constructed as a contemporary capital, Ankara is seen as the implementation area of the new bourgeoisie culture and life; institutional and daily life practices deducted from the Ankara experience are desired to be implemented gradually in all other cities. Starting from the enaction of Building and Roads Law in 1933, there started a new era where new implementations are observed in urban planning field al through Turkey. With plans, the most underdeveloped parts of the country were aimed to have a contemporary appearance. However, the Western Anatolian cities a large majority of which were burnt down during the war, were already undergoing a re-construction process since 1923, albeit with the old approaches. Modern approaches resulted in fundamental changes in both Late Ottoman and Early Republican Eras were implemented widely in cities that had ports and railway connections after the Tanzimat reforms, and in several cities and towns, with the new construction regulations of the Republican regime. However, for some reason it is possible to say that for the first period Istanbul and for the second period Ankara centered the prevailing discussions. In this review, the focus is given to four urban city centers (Manisa, Afyon, Burdur, Isparta) located in Central Western Anatolia. Within this framework, this article investigates, (a) the fundamental changes in cities as a result of reforms in the Late Ottoman era; (b) the searches for the modernization of cities and their effect on Anatolian cities in alignment with the legal arrangements achieved by the determination of building a new nation state in Early Republican Era, resting on the plans of four cities selected in a comparative way. As a draw of the research it is concluded that the development of the four cities in Late Ottoman era and the planning of the Early Republican Era, have similarities since they are achieved in the context of modernization. For instance, government centers envisaged as a space organization preserve their place in the urban integrity in the succeeding periods. This is an indication of the continuity. However, there are stylistic differences between the modernizations of these two periods. The characteristics of the buildings, architectural language, typology and their arrangement on space are different. The Republican modernization aimed public modernization in space and secularization, and gave importance to hygiene, public health, 'grandeur' and functionality aspects. There exists similarities and differences within the Early Republican Era itself. In all four cities government centers created in the preceeding era continued to be used as the urban center, however, it changed in the style and form with the open space arrangements and squares that had distinct modernizing effects. Linear axis that links Government Square to the Station and the public buildings along is the indispensible part of the integrity in every city. The compliance of plans to the zoning principles and modern housing neighborhood proposals in "garden city" style comprise the common features in the plans under concern. However, the preparation of these plans by experts with different approaches resulted in a diversity of the implementations. The facts that the last two plans prepared in 1940s are relatively more conservative when compared with the first two, and the preservation of the traditional housing areas, are the most distinct differences. Besides, another diversity is that the city is integrally considered in only the last two plans, while it is limited to specific axis of develepment in the early two cities. These data led the close scrunity of the changes in urban spaces from the Late Ottoman to the Early Republic, which gives us a fundamental point of view regarding the determined period. Besides, it provides different approaches for the reevaluation of some stereotyped thoughts; however, for comprehensive generalizations, research on more plans prepared in the same period and implemented in different geographic regions, is needed.