Page 17 - Çevre Şehir İklim İngilizce - Sayı 4

Aliye Ahu Gülümser - Nur Kardelen Öztürk - Mert Akay - Burak Belli

1. Introduction

Urban transformation, by definition, is the process of continuously improving
the economic, physical, social and environmental conditions of urban areas
(Roberts et al., 2000). However, it is quite difficult to confine such a broad concept
with a single definition. In this context, various studies in the urban planning
literature provide alternative descriptions for urban transformation from different
perspectives (Akkar, 2006; Donnison, 1993). With a holistic understanding,
urban transformation allows the redevelopment and revitalization of the
economic and structural conditions of an area and its functional dynamics by
balancing environmental quality and social diversity. From this point of view,
urban transformation is related to the planning and management of the existing
urban environment rather than the planning and development of new urban
areas. Therefore, urban transformation processes are affected by uncertainties
faced in urban development process conditioned by the presence of various
actors such as city planners, developers (housing sector investors, real estate
development specialists, etc.), designers (architects, urban designers, etc.),
contractors, citizens (as users) and local governments (Aykaç, 2022; Oliveira,
2016:31). In this direction, it would be useful to reveal the current situation in the
urbanization literature related to urban transformation in order to understand
the multi-layered structure of complex urban transformation processes.
Since the internal characteristics of urban transformation have evolved
throughout history (Roberts et al., 2017:9), it is associated with many other
topics in modern urbanization literature. In this context, there are important
studies that focus on the semantic dimension of urban transformation and
conceptualize the term in a way to describe its internal dynamics (Akkar, 2006;
Ataman and Tuncer, 2022; Genç, 2008; Hölscher and Frantzeskaki, 2021; Lichfield,
1992; Roberts et al., 2000). Besides these studies, there are other remarkable
ones that examine the social (Demirli et al. 2015; Keresztély and Scott, 2012;
Murzyn, 2006; Sun and Zhu, 2022; Ülken and Edgü, 2005), economic (Kemec
et al., 2019; Mikelsone et al., 2021; Parlak, 2020; Sepe, 2014) and ecological
(Bonavia, 1978; Delgado-Ramos and Guibrunet, 2017; Diker, 2019; Han, 2012;
Németh and Langhorst, 2014) aspects of urban transformation. Moreover,
various researchers also examine the political aspect of urban transformation
since the practice of urban planning is directly related to the policy planning
(Chatterji, 2013; Grandin et al., 2018; Levine, 1994; Zografos et al., 2020). In
addition to all these, there are also quantitative studies conducted to evaluate
and measure the effects of urban transformation practices (Demir and Yılmaz,
2012; Elisei et al., 2020; Gür et al., 2019; Huang et al., 2018; Yilmaz, 2020).
On the other hand, the concept of urban transformation in Türkiye has
found a place with a more independent definition instead of being associated

2 The Journal of Environment, Urban and Climate