A Framework to Assess Post-Intervention Sustainability of Urban Heritage Places.

Heritage places have become the arena of various interventions due to their socio-cultural and economic values. However, new interventions for urban regeneration may have a destructive impact on the physical, social and economic aspects of urban heritage places. As a result, the sustainability of heritage places becomes questionable. The study aims to examine interventions and their impact on sustainability in two urban heritage places in Turkey: Tarlabaşı, İstanbul and Kemeraltı, İzmir. In Tarlabaşı, historic buildings were expropriated and destroyed while people living in the area were displaced. A completely different approach was used in Kemeraltı, where a bottom-up approach has been adopted and holistic strategies have been developed considering both residents’ needs and the values of heritage place. While interventions in Tarlabaşı represent unsustainable modes of implementation; interventions in Kemeraltı suggest that there is scope for sustainability where the physical setting is preserved, the social environment is not changed but empowered, and economic activities continue together with control in rent increase. Looking at interventions in Tarlabaşı and Kemeraltı, and bearing in mind the international documents published by ICOMOS and UNESCO, the study aims to assess the postintervention sustainability of urban heritage places. To do this, it focuses on intervention approaches, assess their impact on physical setting, social environment, and economic context and categorizes each of them from the most destructive to the most sustainable.