Mersin City-Lab: Co-creative and participatory design approach for a circular neighbourhood

While environmental, economical and social challenges that the world has been facing recently are increasing dramatically; cities have played critical role in generation many of these problems like negative impacts on environment and overconsumption of resources. Most of the cities today face severe sustainability challenges including sanitation, air pollution, environmental degradation, over population and lack of livability. However, cities may also raise answers to find solutions against many of such complex urban problems, since they are assumed as creative and innovative platforms for social ecosystem of ideas. In this sense, there is increasing interest in ‘City Laboratories’ or ‘Urban Living Labs’, which are established to provide creative experimental platforms with participation of city actors to discuss urban sustainability issues before implementation of deep and structural urban changes for citizens. They provide participatory, co-creative and experimental platforms for self-organizing cities. The aim of this paper is to discuss a collaborative City Laboratory approach -Mersin City Lab- to achieve sustainability principles during urban regeneration process for the selected case-study area located in Mersin. Mersin City Lab focuses on two aspects: Firstly, ‘City Lab’ approach, involves citizens and stakeholders into decision-making process. Secondly, it  focuses on urban transformation process with circularity principles including water, mobility, energy, waste management, food and circular economy to achieve sustainable neighborhood development. The paper starts with introduction of ‘city-gaming’ methodology which has been adopted as the main structure of participation of multi-stakeholders. It continues with discussions on stages of the case-study project through implementation of workshops and game sessions by participation of multi stake-holders. Following, the results gathered from overall evaluations of participants’ proposals regarding land-use, mobility and urban water management, local economy, urban development, urban agriculture and food strategies in neighborhood level are discussed. Finally, the paper concludes with impacts of City Labs approach and city-gaming methodology on decision-making process for real urban problems and urban settings

Multidisciplinary Researches in Cultural Heritage Studies: An Approach on Akkale Cistern in Erdemli, Mersin

Conservation, reinforcement and restoration of architectural heritage requires multidisciplinary approaches which should be organised in precise steps that are similar to those used in medical science. Architectural conservation decisions must rely on full understanding of the historical, material, structural, geological and environmental information related to the building and its setting. The aim of this paper is to discuss phases of a multidisciplinary approach applied to develop a conservation project for the ancient cistern building, located in Akkale archaeological site in Mersin (Turkey). Firstly, architectural description of the ancient cistern building in the light of current information revealed by archeological excavations is presented. Then, methods and technics conducted by each expert group are discussed explaining the main results obtained from each study. Finally, organization of multidisciplinary studies and results gained from each step are displayed through a flow chart diagram showing process of research and data from one phase to another to develop architectural conservation program

Eski Ziraat Bankası yapısı restorasyon projesi, Mersin

This thesis subjects the old Agricultural Bank Building in Mersin, which is one of the important traditional late 19th and early 20th century buildings of Mersin and which reflects important architectural features of that period. The main scope of this thesis is to prepare a conservation and restoration project for the أOld Agricultural Bank Buildingؤ which will pass the historical, architectural, cultural values of the building to the next generations. The study is composed of six subjects. In the introduction, short description of the building is given stating its significant architectural values. It is continued with the aim of the study, as well as the framework and methodology of the study. The second topic covers the documentation of the building and its nearby environment describing its present state together with the location of the building within Mersin and the general settlement characteristics of the nearby environment. The documentation continues with analysis of the building related to the building elements and materials; construction techniques; structural system; physical problems covering the material deteriorations and structural deformations; and finally evaluation of changes. The third subject comprises research related to the historical background of the building as well as the nearby environment within the historical development of Mersin. It is followed by the fourth topic, which covers comparative study of the physical and architectural features of the building with examples from bank and entrepot/depot buildings as well as other traditional buildings that belong to same period in Mersin. During the fifth subject, which is the restitution stage, evaluation related to the exploration of the previous states of the building is carried out. The study concludes with the last section, which covers the evaluation of collected information up to thisM.Arch. - Master of Architectur

Türkiye kıyısal arkeolojik çevreleri için bütünleşik yönetim politikaları: Erdemli-Silifke kıyı bölgesi, Mersin

Being important natural areas due to togetherness of terrestrial and water ecosystems; coastal araes (sea, lake and river coasts) possesses important historic and cultural environments shıowing relationship of mankind with water developed during different periods since ancient periods onwards. In this sense; having housed various civilizations since anquity onwards, Turkey has diverse and rich coastal archaeological sites. However, in addition to natural processes occuring in short and long terms due to their dynamic and evolving nature, athmospheric events, coastal erosions, climate change; developments of rapid urbanization, tourism, industry and infrastructure which have enourmously accelarated since Industrial Evolution have causes irreversibel destruction of natural, cultural and archaeological values of coastal araes. The coastal management policies that have been gaining importance during recent years aim to develop appropriate policies for providing sustainability of natural and cultural values of coastal areas within their conservation-use balance. Within the light of this information; the scope of this thesis is to identify integrated management policies for coastal archaeological environments and to discuss and bring together existing planning and management tools in Turkey in order to develop national management policies. For this purpose, in the First Chapter of the study, historical development of international policies, theoretical discussions and related concepts in relation with planning and and management of coastal archaeological areas is presented. Accordingly, principles related to concept of Integrated Coastal Zone Management (ICZM) are put forth. This section is concluded with related to reasons and contents for necessities of integrated management of coastal archaeological environments. In the second Chapter of the study, the planning and management tools related with integrated management of coastal archaeological sites within the legislative and administrative system of Turkey are discussed. For this purpose; firstly, historical development archaeological heritage conservation and coastal policies are studied. Secondly; present tools related to decision-making process including survey and registration, planning, implementation, control and monitoring are displayed through the examination of the current situation. The Third Chapter includes case-study research which has been structured in two phases. In the first phase; Regional Analysis, by which impacts of national policies within the light of historic perspective and existing tools of Turkey on Mediterranean Region is put forward. Second phase of case-study includes detailed research related to values and problems of archaeological sites located in Erdemli-Silifke coastal region. The Fourth Chapter, includes evaluations related to results of case-study research. In this sense; the cultural landscape characteristics of coastal areas are put forward within the light of assessments regarding integrity of archaeological, natural and rural characteristics of Erdemli-Silifke coastal region. In the second phase; the natural and man-caused problems threatening these values, which are followed by administrative problems according to existing legislative and administrative system that have been displayed in the Second Chapter, are discussed. Within the light of these information and experiences, integrated management principles required for integrated conservation of coastal archaeological sites are proposed throughout the Proposals and Conclusions Chapter, which constitutes the last section of the study. In the second phase, an administrative model for case-study area is proposed. The last section of the study which forms the Conclusions phase includes evaluations to achieve development of national level policies in Turkey.Ph.D. - Doctoral Progra

Mersin City-Lab: Co-creative and participatory design approach for a circular neighbourhood

While environmental, economical and social challenges that the world has been facing recently are increasing dramatically; cities have played critical role in generation many of these problems like negative impacts on environment and overconsumption of resources. Most of the cities today face severe sustainability challenges including sanitation, air pollution, environmental degradation, over population and lack of livability. However, cities may also raise answers to find solutions against many of such complex urban problems, since they are assumed as creative and innovative platforms for social ecosystem of ideas. In this sense, there is increasing interest in ‘City Laboratories’ or ‘Urban Living Labs’, which are established to provide creative experimental platforms with participation of city actors to discuss urban sustainability issues before implementation of deep and structural urban changes for citizens. They provide participatory, co-creative and experimental platforms for self-organizing cities. The aim of this paper is to discuss a collaborative City Laboratory approach -Mersin City Lab- to achieve sustainability principles during urban regeneration process for the selected case-study area located in Mersin. Mersin City Lab focuses on two aspects: Firstly, ‘City Lab’ approach, involves citizens and stakeholders into decision-making process. Secondly, it  focuses on urban transformation process with circularity principles including water, mobility, energy, waste management, food and circular economy to achieve sustainable neighborhood development. The paper starts with introduction of ‘city-gaming’ methodology which has been adopted as the main structure of participation of multi-stakeholders. It continues with discussions on stages of the case-study project through implementation of workshops and game sessions by participation of multi stake-holders. Following, the results gathered from overall evaluations of participants’ proposals regarding land-use, mobility and urban water management, local economy, urban development, urban agriculture and food strategies in neighborhood level are discussed. Finally, the paper concludes with impacts of City Labs approach and city-gaming methodology on decision-making process for real urban problems and urban settings