| Descripción: |
In the province of Istanbul, many green areas of great functional significance have been destroyed by rapid and unplanned urbanization, urban sprawl, inadequate infrastructure, mass internal immigration and other like reasons. Available open spaces are both inadequate in size and the standards used in their design also do not accord with, or reflect, modern life style expectations. In the aftermath of the disastrous Marmara earthquake of 1999, the importance of adequate open spaces in Istanbul that can be utilized for purposes of evacuation, gathering and sheltering became painfully evident. In the present study, the existing green areas or open spaces in the district of Zeytinburnu, which according to the JICA study is one of the ten districts facing the strong possibility of another earthquake disaster, were investigated from the point of view of their requirements, both prior to and after an earthquake. It was established that the number of existing active and passive green areas per person does not meet the expected standards. These areas are also not homogeneously and effectively distributed. There is need for open spaces reserved for more than one purpose in cases of emergencies. In urban development projects and applications areas having vital importance in case of a disaster should be planned so that they are located close to ‘residential areas’ are permanent, sufficiently large, easily controllable and accessible to the public. In view of the fact that in addition to their physical, psychological, economic and ecological functions they also serve as evacuation spaces in case of an earthquake and/or similar disasters green areas should be considered within the context of risk and disaster management. With this purpose in mind, we have evaluated such areas in the district of Zeytinburnu in terms of adequacy and needs and have made proposals in terms of requirements and risk improvements. The geographical information system was utilized in order to minimize the existing deficiencies.Key Words : Gren areas, Earthquake ; Gren corridor |
