CIPA 2003 XIX th International Symposium, 30 September - 04 October, 2003, Antalya, Turkey
Figure 3. Plan of the case area
This area composed of narrow organic streets that are defined
by attached buildings where still keep their spatial quality of
human scale and the local identity. The new developing districts
of the city have a contrasting layout to the urban pattern of this
area that makes Liman Arkasi unique in the city scale.
Buildings are dominantly in attached organization, 2 storey
high and having flat roofs. They are mostly painted into white
color. There are small balconies projecting from the first floor
level and supported with S or I motive supports, which are
characteristic features of British period (TPO, 1979). The
buildings are mainly used for housing besides a few touristic
and recreational purposes. However, this functioning is not
sufficient to attract people to this area. Due to the functional,
physical and image obsolescence, it lost its livability and
attractiveness. On the contrary, this district is an area that must
be conserved due to its characteristics features and plays a
significant role for the cultural tourism, which is one of the
contemporary trends of today.
In this paper, a street, which reflects the characteristics of the
area will be selected and, it will be analyzed physically and
functionally in order to find out its present condition. Finally, a
revitalization proposal will be put forward in order to
rehabilitate the physical and functional condition of the street.
The aim of this paper is to constitute a model for the similar
areas.
In the following part, physical and functional analysis of the
case study area will be presented.
2. PHYSICAL AND FUNCTIONAL ANALYSIS OF THE
CASE AREA IN TWO SCALE
Streets; are the most potent public places for social activities to
occur, and the most effective elements in linking separate
entities (Moughtin, 1992). In order to identify the existing
physical and functional characteristics of the selected street in
Limanarkasi, physical and functional analysed carried out both
in space and unit scales.
The case area is a narrow pedestrian street. It is strongly
defined by continuous building blocks that are mainly housing.
Street itself is a meeting place that extends itself into the house
at ground floor level. People carry out their sitting room into the
street; they sit into the street and keep their doors open to watch
the outside. The traditional buildings along the street are in
human scale. There is a slight fluctuation on skyline properties.
The buildings along the street have no unity problem. The units
are mainly used for accommodation of the residents, only two
of them are used for touristic and recreational purposes. One is
used for art workshop and the other is used as restaurant. The
base covering of street is parquet. There is no adequate street
furnishing and landscape along the streets (Figure 4).
When the street is analysed in unit scale, it is seen that, it is
dominated by traditional houses. Some of the traditional
buildings are physically in poor condition in terms of facade,
architectural detail and structural system. The houses along the
street have one or two storey height. They were constructed by
load bearing system. Stone is the main construction material.
They are continuously located along the streets. Each house
have a small courtyard at their side or back. Each courtyard has
a number of fruit trees in them. Main entrances are generally
given from the middle of the front facades. Some of the houses
have a small front balcony that is the characteristics of the
British architecture in Cyprus around at the beginning of the
20 lh century. They have flat roofs. Timber works were used for
doors. Generally the doors have two wings. Vertical windows
were designed for them that were screened by timber shutter
(Figure 5).
The street is opened to a nice defined square with an arch. The
square is dominated by a white church that is very harmonious
with its environment (Figure 6).
Figure 5. Houses and courtyards
