Planning approachies for rurban areas as new dimension of urbanization: in case of aceh (indonesia) region

In the two decades, rural areas, which are most affected by the urbanization process, have become important again with the economic-social transformation and socio-cultural changes. Developing countries such as Indonesia have been significantly affected by this change process and rural areas have started to become areas that include service-oriented employment from an agricultural production-based economy. This phenomenon is observed that non-agricultural economic activities that emerged in urban areas started to emerge in new settlements (rurban areas) characterized on traditional socio-cultural activities. This development can be seen in the immediate vicinity of middle-scale cities such as Banda Aceh as well as in the periphery of large cities such as Jakarta. Banda Aceh, the capital and largest city of Aceh State of Indonesia, have greatly affected the rural settlements in Aceh Besar region. The city of Banda Aceh, which includes all urban functions, had to face various urbanization problems and limited the development dynamics of the Aceh Besar region being in its periphery. This situation can be explained for two reasons: firstly, Aceh Besar district has not benefited from urban services sufficiently, since Banda Aceh City kept the whole state in its hinterland in terms of services; secondly, Aceh Besar region remained dependent on the city of Banda Aceh in terms of urban services, so it could not create development dynamics within itself. In the thesis study, within the framework of innovative approaches to rural areas, we have made to re-evaluate the rural development dynamics in Aceh Besar region by investigating the potential of rurban system, which is a new concept in Aceh Besar region. It is thought that rurban areas can be a solution to the problems such as urban sprawl that occur between urban-rural connections, which cause, neglected urban agricultural areas, unnecessary growth of urban areas and decrease in agricultural activities, and will be an approach that can bring together the unbalanced relations between rural and urban areas. In this study, it is aimed to develop a new settlement system for Aceh State by analysing the rurban settlement system in case of Aceh Besar Region.