Streets, the usual public spaces of cities, lose their popularities and users every passing day. The reason of this decline is the erroneous transport policies implemented in cities that increase the entrance of automobile into city centers and facilitate faster movement of automobiles at the expense of pedestrians. While pedestrians are marginalized in city centers, automobiles become the primary users of streets. The traffic, noise and air pollution that automobiles cause contribute to the decline of town centers and shopping streets lose their function as meeting places and public spaces. In addition, automobile oriented policies create car-dependent urban forms and cause sprawl towards the peripheries. Because of the newly developing dwelling areas on the peripheries and the increasingly inaccessible city centers, number of out-of-town shopping centers increase day by day to meet the daily needs. While shopping centers develop, there is now a new tendency to design them with streets, squares and bazaars, with a view to resemble and simulate street life in these shopping centers. This situation shows us that, users, who are the reason of existence of social spaces, actually need the atmosphere of streets.
In this study, while analyzing all these trends and factors, Tunali Hilmi Street, which is a once pedestrian-friendly street in Ankara, will be analyzed. The study has two main research tasks. First, it analyses Tunali Hilmi Street&rsquo / s potentials as a public space and street, through the development of a framework that incorporates the essential urban design theorems with a special focus on street design. Secondly, it carries out a questionnaire on shopping center users in Ankara, in order to assess their choices, preferences, and perceptions regarding shopping centers and Tunali Hilmi Street. Based on the findings of these two analyses, this thesis aims to propose planning and design strategies to improve Tunali Hilmi Street as a public space and to attract more users to it.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:METU/oai:etd.lib.metu.edu.tr:http://etd.lib.metu.edu.tr/upload/2/12611640/index.pdf |
| Date | 01 February 2010 |
| Creators | Bakircioglu Unsal, Burcu |
| Contributors | Babalik Sutcliffe, Ela |
| Publisher | METU |
| Source Sets | Middle East Technical Univ. |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | M.S. Thesis |
| Format | text/pdf |
| Rights | To liberate the content for METU campus |
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