Design of a Sustainable Social Housing Model in Istanbul, Turkey
Date
2022-06-30
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Abstract
In countries where the housing supply has become inadequate due to fast population growth, migration, urbanization, and income inequalities, governments have started to develop policies to provide loans and housing for low-income groups to meet the dramatic rise in demand. Turkey, a country facing such housing challenges, has met the housing needs of low-income groups through illegal squatter settlements. Today, the Housing Development Administration of Turkey (TOKI), the top government-backed housing agency, aims to produce solutions to the housing and urbanization problems in Turkey by targeting mainly the low-and-middle-income groups who cannot enter the housing market under the existing market conditions with their economic statuses. For these households, housing affordability is a problem that prevents them from being able to maintain a minimum standard of life.
The Turkish government has always prioritized increasing the housing stock in terms of numbers and viewed the housing problem as a quantitative deficiency. It is seen purely as an investment good and a guarantee for high-income groups. In actuality, housing is an increasing problem and a cost burden for low-income groups. The dominant thought in increasing the housing stock is not the needs of lower-income groups, but rather the demand of the upper-income groups. In constructing affordable housing, TOKI fails to apply the same care and diligence it applies to upper-income groups. The number of luxury houses is increasing more rapidly than the needed social housing. Efforts to minimize costs have led TOKI to compromise on quality, thus preventing residents from being able to maintain a minimum standard of life.
In this context, the goal of this thesis is to design a housing complex in a low-to-middle-income community in Istanbul, Turkey that will meet the basic needs of the occupants while fulfilling sustainability goals. How can we make a housing complex in an urban area environmentally friendly? How can we solve the environmental problems that exist in current buildings? How can we create a high-performance building as well as a healthy and inhabitable interior? An important factor in the evaluation of affordability is to improve the quality of life of low-to-middle-income families. While there are many approaches to this design, the focus in this thesis is on affordability, accessibility, the attractiveness of the property, user satisfaction, comfort, location, climate, and energy efficiency while also adhering to current building codes and regulations.
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Architecture, Design, Social Housing, Sustainability