Construction along Istanbul's Bosporus needs new regulation: Erdoğan

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has proposed new regulations for future construction on the shore of Istanbul's Bosphorus Strait, repeating his call against rapidly spreading high-rise buildings and in favor of "horizontal urbanization."

"There are buildings with five, six or seven floors on the shore of the beautiful Bosphorus. This is happening because there has been no stable stance against it. There is now a need for a strict new Bosporus law related to this issue. Our Environment and Urban Planning Ministry should take this into a consideration and our government should take a determined step," Erdoğan said in a speech at a conference hosted by the ministry on Jan. 27.

"I'm not saying we should reset all construction. I'm in favor of construction on the shore of the Bosphorus. But all those ugly structures should be taken down and replaced. This needs a new regulation," he added.

"I am not in favor of vertical architecture. I am in favor of landscape architecture. Human beings should live close to the earth, not far away from the earth. Today's Turkey does not deserve such ugliness," Erdoğan said, criticizing irregular urbanization in Turkey stemming from modernization and mass migration to big cities.
He defended urban transformation projects to renew slum areas of cities, but also criticized some aspects of these projects for creating a "Western standardization."

"While our cities are rescued from the invasion of slum-like structures by urban transformation projects, they must not be pushed into the pockets of characterless architectural schools," he said.

"Those ugly buildings made of concrete, iron and piles of bricks have begun to occupy our cities, our rivers and even our coasts," he added, calling for...