Sustainable Praxis on Istanbul’s Residential and Green Areas by the Henri Prost’s Development Plans

Abstract

The idea of sustainability has not found place in the agenda of the city in Istanbul long years, which has rapidly developed and vastly overpopulated with immigration. Today on sustainability and green urbanism not only new and innovative design and planning ideas have been used, but also in old urban planning methods recently come-back. Istanbul’s first Master plans planned by French architect-urbanist Henri Prost with “residential areas,” and “green areas” in balanced. Almost after a century, his Master plan and these green areas still significant in the green planning of the city as nuclei. The founder of l’urbanisme (urbanism) theories of the twentieth century, French planner Henri Prost’s Istanbul city’s modernization plans considered vague and controversial many years. Although Prost plans always been popular in every period as the product of the doctrinal structure of the French Urbanism School (l’ecole), its effects have lasted from the 1950s to the 70s to 80s until today. The twentieth century’s vehicle-based urban planning theories and discourses of CIAM School evolved to the non-vehicle, green and human-oriented plannings with the climate concerns. By the last quarter of the twentieth century, with concern on increasing uncontrolled housing areas, road network, heavy traffic, high carbon emission and less green areas, the cities had to confront being as harmful places for human life. Today, world cities like Paris and London searching the solutions with the specifically arranged zone zoning regulations like the twentieth century planners Henri Prost. Hence, this research aimed to present solution of today’s cities problematics via re-examination Prost plans. Consequently, findings achieved after the re-examinations on Prost Master plans the purpose of the old “zoning” applications to separate cities into functions such as residential areas and green areas recently with the sustainability entered the city planning agenda the “zoning” planning for “sustainable protection” of the cities to develop balanced relations between “people” and “nature.” Also, recently many cities expanded the “zoning” regulations, initiated to maintain climate-change, sustainability, green architecture, pollution, even pandemic, etc. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2024.