Haluk Gerçek's summary of third bridge controversy

Professor Haluk Gerçek of Istanbul Technical University wrote the piece below, which originally appeared in the Sunday supplement of the Turkish newspaper Radikal (19 July 2009).



Three points strike me:

1. The lack of public debate around the need for or location of a third bridge across the Bosphorus
2. Bidding for the proposed 3rd bridge is scheduled for September, but the Commission for the Preservation of Cultural and Natural Heritage has not yet approved the project, which will affect protected forested areas
3. The addition of train tracks to the proposed bridge does not fit with an existing or planned rail system.

Automobile bridges with add-on train tracks

Haluk Gerçek, Professor, Istanbul Technical University

Radikal İki, 19 July 2009

The Government has effectively turned the question of where the third bridge will be built into a mystery play. The General Directorate of Highways has been working on alternative paths for quite some time. At first, five to six choices for the crossing were under consideration, and of these three were located to the north of the Fatih Sultan Mehmet Bridge. Subsequently, the highest authorities – the Prime Minister and the Transportation Minister – announced that the bridge would be built north of Istanbul. According to this announcement, the third bridge and connecting roads would be linked with the Black Sea Coastal Highway and serve as part of the North Marmara Motorway. However, in order not to give cause to land speculators, work was done in secret and no information was given about the location of the bridge. With the conclusion of [current] work, the Transportation Minister announced last week that two options for the location of the third bridge remained and that one of these would be selected: between Beykoz and either Tarabya or Sariyer.

At last the puzzle was nearly solved. The print and television media immediately started questioning experts, leaders of professional associations and members of the local population. Which crossing was more appropriate? What areas would the connecting roads pass through? How much had property prices increased in places where the roads would likely be built? Who had bought these lands? There were reports that work to open/build roads had begun in some highly inaccessible places of Istanbul’s last remaining forests. Or were these roads the approach roads for the third bridge? Finally, the General Director of Highways, to assuage the angry, chronic opponents of the bridge, informed the public of an important detail: the bridge would include a railway. This new announcement stirred once again arguments that had nearly died down. Was the inclusion of a railway a good thing? Or was the matter more complicated, the impact deeper?

No third bridge in urban plans

There appears to be no end to the confusion caused by all these questions and arguments. In fact, in this type of project, to answer these questions properly and make sound decisions for the benefit of society the requisite course of action is clear: First of all, it is necessary to prepare a city plan that aims to guide the city’s future development in accordance with clear goals and policies. At the same time and in coordination with this plan, it is also necessary to prepare a transportation plan. In this plan, the future projects to be undertaken in the city’s transportation system, the projects’ priorities, their economic, social and environmental impacts must be made clear through a comprehensive and transparent evaluation. The financial resources required for these projects should be realistically estimated. Throughout the planning and selection process, the opinions of residents, experts in the field, professional groups and civil society organizations should be obtained and evaluated. Finally, there should be a selection reached through a broad consensus resting on a scientific, social and economic foundation.

Istanbul’s 1:100,000 scale Strategic Plan was prepared by the Istanbul Metropolitan Planning and Urban Design Center (İMP), which was established by the Greater Istanbul Municipality (İBB). In a suit filed by professional associations, this plan was ruled invalid by the court with the justification that the İMP had no planning authority. Reviewing the plan briefly, the İBB City Planning Directorate revised the plan with a number of changes and the new plan was approved by the İBB Municipal Council. This time, the court decision that the pervious plan was invalid was overruled by the Superior Administrative Court. Regardless of which strategic plan is valid, one thing is clear: neither plan includes a proposal for a third bridge.

While Istanbul’s Strategic Plan was on the verge of completion by the İMP, a Japanese consortium hired by the Japanese International Cooperation Agency (JICA), together with the İBB Transportation Planning Directorate, began to revise the Transportation Master Plan, [which had originally been] prepared by Istanbul Technical University (İTÜ) in 1997 with a target [for implementation] of 2010, [now] with a target of 2023. As with the previous plans, the urban and transportation plans were not prepared together in this planning process. At the end of two years’ work, JICA submitted the Draft Final Report to the İBB and requested the views of interested organizations. In this plan, there were two Bosphorus crossings that had not appeared in the 1997 İTÜ plan: The third bridge and the Bosphorus tunnel project for automobiles. However, the third bridge in this plan was not, as the Government wanted, to the north, but as with the project proposed previously by the 17th Region Highways Directorate, between Vaniköy and Arnavutköy. The collection of İBB [municipal] and [national-level] ministerial views regarding this plan continued for a long time. Then, because Istanbul’s strategic urban plan changed, the task of completing the Transportation Master Plan was given to the Transportation Planning Directorate. It seems that the transportation master plan prepared by JICA will soon be shelved as another invalid plan document.

In order to open bidding for the third bridge to the north – which was decided by the Transportation Ministry as if no local planning existed – this project must be officially included in the city plan. Furthermore, because the connecting roads will pass through [officially] designated forest lands, the Commission for the Preservation of Cultural and Natural Heritage must approve the project. We will observe together how this process advances.

A railway on top of the bridge

Railways have for a long time and [in different places] around the world been incorporated into suspension bridges either above or below the roadways. However, our bridge projects boast an interesting distinction. In both the third Bosphorus Bridge and the Izmit Bay Bridge the proposal for a railway across the bridge came from the Highways General Directorate. It is clear that these “train crossings” have been added to the bridge projects by highway engineers in order to be able to say, “What else do you want? A train will run across the bridge” in anticipation of criticism from mass transit groups opposed to highway bridges. There is no analysis of how these add-on train tracks will be connected with urban and regional rail networks or how problems related to rail system design and engineering standards (e.g., slope and the location of stations) will be addressed. In any case, it is pointless to expect these [to be addressed], as this is not a planning effort but rather a proposal advanced by highway engineers. The “railway” added to the bridge appears on drawings as two pathetic lines, with no clear idea of how or where the two ends will go.

Let us conclude the article by repeating a question asked frequently of professionals in the field: “Does Istanbul need a third bridge?” The answer to this question depends on how you view the city and transportation. The logic of the Transportation Minister is rather simple. Today the two bridges are clogged. Because the city is growing fast and the number of automobiles is growing much faster, a third, even a fourth and fifth bridge are necessary.

The opinions of those who say a third bridge must not be built are well known. Bridges carry vehicles, not people. No matter how many roads, bridges and interchanges are built to carry the fast rising number of automobiles in cities, the transportation and traffic [congestion] problem will not be solved. Because these projects create their own traffic and soon become clogged. [Urban] planning literature is full of similar examples from around the world. Istanbul’s two bridges and connecting highways are unquestionably among them. Instead of this sort of project focused on cars, which incur extremely high social costs, the fast development of an extensive and efficient mass transportation system is necessary that makes it easy for people to access their daily activities in the city. In addition, a third bridge and connecting highways to the north are far from the heavily traveled arteries (desire lines) of Istanbul. And the transit traffic expected for the third bridge to the north, is less than three percent of the total Bosphorus crossing traffic. That is, this project, except for the traffic it will induce, will have little impact on the congestion on the existing two bridges.

In order not to utterly destroy Istanbul, it is necessary to stand on firm ground and abandon the three big transportation projects that are based on top-down decisions not guided by planning and that will irreparably seal the city’s future: the third Bosphorus bridge and automobile tunnel together with the inner-city roadway tunnels, some of which have already been built under the banner of “Seven tunnels for Seven hills.” Otherwise, future generations will remember those who implemented these projects as the leaders who drove the last nails into Istanbul’s coffin.

Üçüncü Köprü ve Belgrad Ormanı

Bir koşucu arkadaşıma göre Belgrad Ormani tehdit altında – orman bitecek diye söyledi. Beklentisi öyle.

Bütün kentliler için orman ve oradaki su kaynakları bayağı önemli. Central Park NYC’nin akciğeri olduğu denirse, Belgrad Ormanı’nın sayesinde İstanbul nefes alabilir. Ve orada her hafta sonunda koşucular, oriyantiringciler ve doğa sporcular antreman yapıyorlar. Orman bitirse, İstanbul’un spor kültürü nasıl gelişecek, arkadaşlar nerede antrenman yapacaklar?

Ulaşım ve logistik herhangi bir ekonomi için temel önemi var. İstanbul ve Türkiye’nin gelişimi, geleceği için bayağı önemli bir soru. Ama çözüm nedir? Ulaşım için 3. köprü yeterli bir çözüm değil, ama herhalde 3. köprü olacak. Nerede? Bilmiyoruz.

Şu ana kadar 3. köprünün nerede yapılmasına karar verilmesi için karmaşık bir süreç geçirilmiş. 19 Temmuz tarihiyle Radikal İki’de İstanbul Teknik Üniversitesi Profesör Haluk Gerçek süreci özeterek şöyle yazdı

http://www.radikal.com.tr/Radikal.aspx?aType=RadikalEklerDetay&ArticleID=945659&Date=23.07.2009&CategoryID=42

Ne olursa olsun orman korunsun. Fakat, kurallar ve yasalar 3. köprü gelince ormanı koracağı kadar güçlü olmaz, çünkü ekonomik olarak ormanın değeri bilinmez.