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TAKSIM URBAN DESIGN COMPETITION

MAÇ K A BEŞİ K TA Ş

D OL A PDE R E D O LMA BA H Ç E

TA R L A BA Ş I

GE Z İ & TA K S İ M

B EYO Ğ LU

CONTEXT

TAKSIM IS WHAT IT IS… Taksim Square has been a melting pot of so many instances, one of the few such palimpsest spots in Istanbul, that has been numerously loaded and unfolded historically, culturally, socially and politically. The present situation, therefore, anchors to many instances, layers, and landmarks all at the same time, which makes Taksim a sophisticated and multi-faceted urban stage. This is not to be challenged in favor of one instance or the other.

Taksim is unique with what it has become.

Such contexts represent ideal backgrounds to develop ideas and opinions to create new situations using the existing urban stage for the use and participation of the citizen, the “urbanite”.

K A R A KÖY

CONCEPT

TAKSIM IS A STAGE FOR ALL…

“BRIDGING PEOPLE, SOCIETY AND CULTURE”

TAKSIM-STAGE (TAKSİM-SAHNESİ) The concept proposed by the design team aims to make Taksim an International/local and social/ urban focus/locus. To accomplish this purpose, it adds a layer to the existing urban palimpsest.

Named TAKSIM-STAGE (TAKSİM-SAHNESİ), this layer is conceived as both a place and a medium to accommodate urban happenings and encounters that will foster social interaction and communication, cultural engagement, ideas exchange, social negotiation and tolerance.

TAKSIM URBAN DESIGN COMPETITION

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SCENARIO

TAKSIM IS SENSITIVE TO ALL… TAKSIM-SENSITIVITY (TAKSİM-DUYARLILIĞI) The design team suggests an umbrella occasion that sets the scenario of the concept and defines it as an organization of an annual happening named as TAKSIMSENSITIVITY (TAKSİM-DUYARLILIĞI) that frames the scenario. The Taksim Square, accordingly will host happenings and presentations that will take place during this event for which TAKSIM-STAGE will act as a venue of happenings, encounters, interactions and expressions.

To be initiated as a project/mission of Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality, in collaboration with universities and civil society organizations (NGOs) and initiatives, TAKSIM-SENSITIVITY will elaborate a theme, that will be specified as a socially encompassing agenda, via different communication and expression media such as exhibitions, talks, competitions, public rallies, and cinematic screenings. The event will provide a social arena where all sections of society will have an access to its content.

TAKSIM URBAN DESIGN COMPETITION

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TAKSIM URBAN DESIGN COMPETITION

REALIZATION

MULTI-LEVEL REPRESENTS THE MULTI-LAYERED...

GREEN MEETS THE SQUARE… TAKSIM-STAGE and TAKSIM-SENSITIVITY are materialized with two intertwined design agents: Bridge Alley (Taksim Gezi Yolu); an elevated scenic platform/path that wraps the Gezi Park and Green Podium (Yeşil Podyum); a green floor that stretches the green tissue of the Park down to the Square and the Cumhuriyet Avenue.

BRIDGE ALLEY (TAKSIM GEZI YOLU) Gezi Park is the only major green zone in the Square. The land occupied by the Park had been defined as an open green area since the late 19th century, which was utilized first as the courtyard of a military barrack complex, then a football field and finally a park which gave the Square a green texture. At present, the park acts as the natural extension of the Square and is a refuge that absorbs and pacifies the intense movement along its peripheries. The presence of grown trees is an asset which adds scale to the Square and offers a climatically pleasing environment. In all aspects, the Park is both an attractive recreational island in the energetic life cycle of Taksim, and also a backstage where the events taking place in the Square and its environs can be tracked and viewed.

The Bridge Alley is inspired from the omni presence of this green open area in the history of Taksim, and particularly from its current state which offers the potential to be involved more densely in the urban scene as a public park in downtown Istanbul. The design team, therefore deems it necessary to protect the identity of park as a refuge and urban park but suggests to utilize it as a more active urban and social connector by coupling it with a second layer that is materialized with a bridge alley and green podium.

Bridge Alley is the elevated, scenic and pedestrian-reserved backbone of TAKSIM-STAGE that acts as a medium of engaging, encountering, spectating, expression and negotiating via thematic and casual happenings. The Alley will form a public venue to diversify public use, from recreation, leisure and culture to self-expression and act in conjunction with the green texture defined by the Park. It will be exploited as a hub/melting pot of all sorts of current, global and local urban and social agendas - art/culture/politics/social/environmental. The thematic event, TAKSIM-SENSITIVITY will offer a yearround program and spatialize it in the event spots of TAKSIM-STAGE: bridge alley, green podium and Taksim Square.

The frame and the urban axis composed by the Bridge Alley also links well, both physically and visually, and functionally with Culture Valley that extends as far as Maçka and Beşiktaş, along the Cumhuriyet Boulevard, and the culturally vivid districts of Beyoğlu, Tarlabaşı and Gümüşsuyu which converge to the Square from different directions.

TAKSIM-ART Bridge Alley including its structural feet, accommodates happening spots which vary from of exhibition niches, display boxes, spectating plots, relaxing corners to free expression nodes.

These will be the venues of TAKSIM-SENSITIVITY program events as well as casual or planned events that can be organized independently by social initiatives with the collaboration of Municipality. One such partnered happening that can be realized, for example, is a National art competition: TAKSIM-ART. The winning works can be exhibited until the next competition in the structural feet of the Alley, that are designed as display boxes of about 4mx4m.

Alley, can be explored spontaneously/randomly by anyone passing through Taksim for some reason, or visited intentionally to engage with the happenings. It offers pedestrian connections to the educational and cultural focal points (Atatürk Cultural Center, ITU Taşkışla Campus and Atatürk Library) located around Taksim square with the navigation routes to be created in the Park plane and/or Bridge plane.

While it is possible to be included in the Alley with elevators placed at certain intervals around the park and pedestrian ramps arranged inside the park, two points are considered significant to contextualize the elevated navigation: Taksim Square and Atatürk Library (Atatürk Kütüphanesi). These points are important urban references for different reasons. Cumhuriyet Monument is a national testimonial of Republic and has become an iconic feature of the Square since 1928. The monument, which has acquired a panoramic context after a later arranged circular landscape around it, is the strongest symbolic focus in the square. As an anchor of the square, it is important that this iconic symbol be approachable, visible and watchable in any new spatial and social arrangement to be proposed to Taksim.

1914

5th Century CE

TAKSIM THEATER “MAJIK MOVIE THEATER”

“lead SARCOPHAGUS” “NECROPOLIS” CEMETARY and HERMITAGE

1915 CITY HUB

“GRAND CHAMPS DES MORTS” “AYAS PASHA CEMETERY” Byzantine Necropolis (İstanbul’un Tarihsel Topografyası-Wolfang Müller Wiener, p.222.)

Taksim Theater, Giulio Mongeri

1928

1560 SURP AGOP CEMETARY CATHOLIC / PROTESTANT CEMETARY

TAKSIM REPUBLIC MONUMENT

1936 HENRI PROST’S PARK NUMBER 2

Taksim Monument; Pietro Canonica and Guilio Mongeri; national liberation and foundation of the Republic

The Armenian Cemetery (Agos Newspaper Archive)

1732 TAKSIM WATER DISTRIBUTION CENTER (MAKSEM) & RESERVOIR

1794 (renovation 1898)

CELEBRATIONS OF THE “GHAZI DAY” Henri Prost’s Plans for Park Number 2; zoning plan for Taksim

THE FRENCH CONSULATE and CULTURAL CENTER “HÔPITAL DES FRANÇAIS DE LA PESTE À PÉRA”.

KRISTAL MUSIC HALL

Ghazi Day Celebrations -festivals and celebrations of Republic, Ghazi Day ; May 19th Commemoration of Atatürk, Youth and Sports Day

Maksem in Taksim (Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality Press Archive)

1804-1940

1938-1960

1939-1965 French Consulate on İstiklal Avenue

TAKSIM ARTILLERY BARRACKS AND TALIMHANE

TAKSIM MUNICIPAL MUSIC HALL

1825

1939 DEMOLITION OF TAKSIM BARRACKS

THE

MAÇKA BARRACKS

Taksim Artillery Barracks - Artillery barracks, stadium in 1921, demolished in 1940 by Henry Prosts project, replaced by Gezi Park

1848 MECIDIYE BARRACKS (TAŞKIŞLA)

Municipal Music Hall Taksim garden redesign by Rüknettin Güney

1943 Maçka Barracks - Military barracks, rebuilt as armory, Istanbul Technical University Maçka Campus (SARKIS BALYAN)

MAP BY J.PERVITITCH

Demolution as part of Henri Prost’s project ; İnönü Gezisi Park

1943-1988 TENNIS-FENCINGMOUNTAINEERING CLUB

1853 DOLMABAHÇE GASWORKS Taşkışla - designed as medical school in 1847, barracks in 1849 by William James Smith, renovated to be ITU Campus (SARKIS BALYAN, RAIMONDO D’ARONCO 1894)

1949 GEZI PARK PEDESTRIAN BRIDGE (- 2013)

1861

GÜMÜŞSUYU BARRACKS

Dolmabahçe Gasworks ;palace stables, gazworks,

Tennis-Fencing-Mountaineering Club; Surp Agop Cemetery; club by Rüknettin Güney Fazıl Aksu; demolished ; Hyatt Regency Hotel

1954 HILTON HOTEL

1862 MILITARY SCHOOL (MEKTEB-I HARBIYE) Gezi Park Pedestrian Bridge; designed by Henri Prost, demolished for ecological bridge

Ayas Pasha Cemetery, Gümüşsuyu Hospital 1849 by William James Smith, Gümüşsuyu Barracks in 1850-1861, ITU Campus 1920

1975

1865

1969 BLOODY SUNDAY + AKM

SHERATON HOTEL

TAKSIM MUNICIPAL GARDEN

1877 GERMAN CONSULATE

Istanbul Cultural Palace (AKM) ; Rüknettin Güney, Feridun Kip, Hayati Tabanlıoğlu

2009

ISTANBUL CONGRESS CENTER

1987

PARK HOTEL

Taksim Municipal Garden, 1902 - Garden on protestan and catholic cemetery by M. Deroin, with kiosks, lodge , music hall, demolished

1880 1909 THE MARCH INCIDENT

31ST

Park Hotel (Şefik Oktay, Istanbul Research Institute Archive) ; replace demolished Park Hotel of 1930

AYA TRIADA (HOLY TRINITY) CHURCH

2013

GEZI PROTESTS

2016 2017 TAKSIM MOSQUE

JULY 15TH COUP ATTEMPT

TAKSIM URBAN DESIGN COMPETITION TAKSIM-WATCH & BOSPHORUS-WATCH The Bridge Alley defines a privileged place for the monument to be viewed and photographed from above.

An observation deck, named TAKSIM-WATCH (TAKSİM-BAKISI) which is an extension of the Alley towards the monument in an angled form, a gesture and greeting to the monument, in this context, becomes a primary happening spot from where both the monument and the multi-layered urban texture around it can be captured. The metro station exit in this corner is one of the major access points to the Alley so that it takes public first to this deck. The northeast corner of the competition site where Atatürk Library (Atatürk Kütüphanesi) stands however, has a steeper topography and captures the view of Bosphorus.

Bosphorus view is considered a unique and attractive urban instance to be included in the happenings of TAKSIM-STAGE. A terrace that extends from the Bridge Alley towards the Bosphorus at this point, named BOSPHORUS-WATCH (BOĞAZ-BAKISI), brought it into the context of the Square. Both terraces represent, at the same time, those urban encounters that are unique both to Taksim and Istanbul.

GREEN PODIUM The considerable level difference between Gezi Park and the pedestrianized Taksim Square and Cumhuriyet Avenue is transformed into a fluid one via a topographically articulated green floor, named Green Podium.

The podium serves as a facilitator to stretch the green towards the Square and diffuse the texture of the Gezi Park to the extensively paved Square and Cumhuriyet Avenue as well as to the Bridge Alley. On the square side, the diffusion is done via a partially paved green public amphi. On the Cumhuriyet Avenue, the green flows towards the pedestrianized boulevard by means of softly descending green and paved steps.

The green cascaded floors that forms on both sides of the Park and opens to the square and its hinterland, therefore, serve as both casual happening spots and public arenas of urban and social engagement.

The green amphi that meets the square describes, on the one hand, a new boundary that brings the square, which has turned into a huge, paved and empty void, closer to the human scale. On the other hand, it is envisioned that it will play a major role in decreasing the transit pedestrian traffic, which emerges as a situation in such bare squares like here, and instead encourage participation to the square and TAKSIMSCENE. FREE-SCREEN In its historical development process Taksim Square has gained an identity and memory value as a meeting and demonstration place, especially with the Republic. This is found worthy to sustain, as squares function real venues of democracy where freedom of talk and expression of thought takes place socially. A large screen placed opposite the green amphi, named free-screen, is a public broadcasting platform and an important communication medium of TAKSIM-STAGE concept and TAKSIM-SENSITIVITY scenario, as well as, of the society who will use it to address problems and raise voice.

The Free-Screen: It will be utilized to broadcast such events as TAKSIM-STAGE, TAKSIM-SENSITIVITY and TAKSIM-ART related programs, cultural programs (concerts, forums, performances, festivals and alike) that will be organized by the Municipality and by the state/private/civil organizations in collaboration with the Municipality.

LANDSCAPE

MEDIATOR BETWEEN LAYERS… Natural materials (stone, wood, corten, steel, concrete) and green landscape play an effective and supporting role in the environment conceived. In this respect, increasing the density of the existing green texture in the park and spreading it to the square is seen not only as a concept and scenario adaptation, but also as an action that can relatively reduce the negative effects of the solar heat reflected from the vast paved surfaces and mediate the improvement of environmental conditions.

Portable large boxes containing adult trees are considered supplementary green elements in places where planting trees is not possible or problematic. These boxes are conceived as moveable green backdrops in various events. The green amphi which overlooks the square, has both hard and green surfaces to be used together in crowded events, and partially used in smaller events or for casual use. The hard-surfaced part will help to absorb the crowd partially, and ensure that the green section is less damaged and does not lose its visual effect. Ground covers and perennial plants, applied intensively form the landscape identity of the Green Podium. The texture can create surprising encounters by changing its visuality and color according to climate and daylight (wind, snow, spring, fall etc.) and turn into landscape installations at night with appropriate lighting.

AFTER ALL...

The proposal is an unfinished project open to contributions, collaborations and participations. The social, cultural, art-based activities as well as exhibitions and presentations representing social, political and ideological sensitivities and agendas form the concept of the physical project and its scenario.

The physical setting in this sense is a flexible background for multiple and sustainable activities, more than anything else.

g410792l

TAKSIM URBAN DESIGN COMPETITION

g410792l

TAKSIM URBAN DESIGN COMPETITION

g410792l

TAKSIM URBAN DESIGN COMPETITION

g410792l

TAKSIM URBAN DESIGN COMPETITION

g410792l

TAKSIM URBAN DESIGN COMPETITION

g410792l

TAKSIM URBAN DESIGN COMPETITION

g410792l

TAKSIM URBAN DESIGN COMPETITION

g410792l

TAKSIM URBAN DESIGN COMPETITION

g410792l