The spatial configuration of Tetovo, North Macedonia: The hidden network

Tetova has recently been described as one of Macedonia's irregular cities. Experts and residents often complain of insufficient or lack of parking spaces, playgrounds, green spaces, entertainment and public spaces. The widening of streets, the demolition of buildings, creation of a new order are seen as solutions to many of Tetova's problems. The same ideas that shaped the city's spatial configuration were the planning policies presented after World War II. The concept of "Tabula Rasa", which was also supported by its socialist ideology, suggested that the city should take a new shape. On the other hand, Tetova developed organically without a plan until the Second World War. With the new plan, some parts of the city were transformed, whereas the rest remained the same. While experts and some of the public admire the modernist ideas of the period, they also praise the old city of Tetovo. Although this situation creates confusion in the minds of people, it also leads us to make a synthesis of how the city should continue to develop taking these contradictions into account.There is a hidden movement network in the spatial configuration of the city. A "hidden network" that is not recorded on maps but is actively used and some of which have survived into modern times. The network consists of spaces between the kapijiks. The kapijik is a small door in the garden walls. Neighbors communicate with each other through these doors because they are heeld to be an extension part of the family. If a foreigner has moved using only the main roads leading to the city, residents of the neighborhood could establish fast connections using these hidden kapijik networks. This has been seen as a way to shorten the distances between neighborhoods and integrate the them into the city network. It was not just a small door to the neighbor but it was also a node integrating the household into the city matrix. It was a nodal point integrating all households into one neighborhood and all neighborhoods into the city. The connections between the Kapijiks form an additional network and must be added to the entire spatial configuration of the city to truly understand it. This will help us understand the relationship between spaces within the city. Different religious and ethnic groups have lived and shaped the city of Tetovo for centuries. As a result different social infrastructures are accepted as the cause of different spatial experiences and configurations. The fact that the gardens of the houses, which are private spaces and are open to public activities, confronts us with a different definition and experience of space. This research makes an effort to reveal the interaction between space and people. Accordingly the human experience of space and the importance of social traces in space are recorded as important concepts. The research has been carried out in several stages: the documentation of the Kapijiks which is valid as evidence for archiving today, and the responses of the residents of Tetovo. By collecting oral data from the residents a theoretical map of the organic phase of the city was created, and at the same time they document the earliest phase of the city. The hidden network of the Kapijikas is changing our understanding of the overall configuration of the city of Tetovo. City dwellers are familiar with another form of movement, which is hidden and parallel to the public road. This experience of walking around the city is not known to a foreigner. Organic cities always attract the attention of researchers since they reflect the lifestyle of people in the best way. Thereby the kapjik is an element that was created in the organic period of the city, but that affects the way the city is read. Documenting and reading social traces has led to better understanding how it organizes people and their lives in space. Phenomenologists are interested in the experience of space, which is also reflected in the research of architects, and in this research it helps to reveal what kind of space experience the kapijik provides. In the second part of the research the qualitative and quantitative research methods have been explained in order to investigate the traces of the social aspect in the space. During the documentation of the Kapijiks interviews have been conducted and the interviewers' responses from the residents of Tetovo from different ethnic and religious backgrounds have been collected. It was anticipated that this route was more appropriate as we were dealing with the memories of the residents. On the other hand the space syntax method has been used for the qualitative research method. In this phase the goal was to document the existence of the kapijik. In other words, we wanted to find out in which part of the city the kapijiks still exist and how many there are today. This method helped to shed light on how the hidden network has been formed between the kapijiks and how it has affected the configuration of the city. In order to better understand the Kapijik phenomenon, the interview responses of the residents were evaluated and in terms of phenomenology space and human experiences are included. The spatial development of the city of Tetovo in different periods has been shown in the third part of the research. Although it is a very old city in terms of archeological findings and history, data showing spatial development and documentations are missing. This is because in different periods the city was dominated by different political powers and management systems. The Second World War is a breaking point for Tetovo. The period before the Second World War is known as the organic period that was planned with the participation of the user. The post-World War II period changed the way the state was governed. The establishment of the Yugoslav state and the concepts of the socialist philosophy have influenced also the perspective of the place and experience in the city. The old style made no sense to the socialist state and a new one was proposed. The city was reshaped and was given a new identity. Another feature that distinguishes the city of Tetovo is the small door located in the dividing wall between the neighbors which is called kapijik by the local people. Although it is mentioned in some previous literature, it has never been analyzed so far how this element affects spatial space. The fourth part of the research aims to reveal the hidden network that has an effect on the configurational analysis of the city. In this way, the relationship of the spaces in the city of Tetovo is to come to a conclusion by comparing the spaces and data for two different periods:the organic one and the planned one, with and without hidden network. At the same time, the hypothesis that the hidden network changes configuration has been confirmed by changing syntactic data. In the British Iranian Kayvan Karimi's research two groups of organic cities have been compared: the English ones (Norvich, Bristol, York, Hereford, Canterbury, Winchester) with the Iranian ones (Shiraz, Kerman, Qazvin, Hamedan, Kermanshah, Semnan). In his study this researcher has come to the conclusion that the Iranian cities have a shorter axis of visibility. As a result, as far as the social aspect is concerned, these spaces are less integrated. The kapijik in the city of Tetova dates from the organic period and can be interpreted as a socio-spatial element. So two different principles have been applied in Tetovo: the visual barrier has been given importance – which makes the spaces less integrated according to Karimi's research and at the same time, by adding the hidden network of kapijiks to the configuration of the city it becomes more integrated. It has been shown that the kapijik makes the city more accessible to pedestrians. This shows that Karimi's theory is not applicable for the city of Tetova. Ferati's (2011) research for the city of Tetova also does not include the hidden network. Therefore, when the hidden network of kapijiks is applied to the existing one, the syntactic parameters change and utilize two different sets of principles. Here it seem that the hidden network changes the syntactic data of the city. In the fifth part of the research, the kapijik is discussed from a phenomenological perspective by paying attention to the comprehensive way of reading and naming of places. Since the division of public and private in the city of Tetovo is not sharply divided, this division has been discussed in the property section. Kapijik has remained as an element used only by middle-aged and elderly people today. Young age groups do not want to integrate into it. On the other hand the elderly group were not able to get used to the new way of life that was anticipated according to the new plan. The sixth chapter describes the achievements of the study. The fieldwork has made it possible to document today's kapijiks that have never been documented before. After the documentation was completed, the impact of the kapidzik network in the whole city was evaluated. Kayvani's theory for organic cities does not apply to the city of Tetova. Tetova and some other cities where kapidziks are found, have presented a different form of space that increases the syntactic values and allows women, who have been excluded from public life to appear in the public space. In addition to Tetova kapijik has also been utilized in Kosova and Albania. A similar structure as a hidden passage, has been utilized in some French cities such as Lyon, Mâcon, Saint Ètienne and Chambéry; it was known by the name "traboules". Therefore although the forms may change in cultures, the idea behind them remains the same, an alternative and secret way. In conclusion this study has shown that the kapidzik was effective in naming the places in Tetovo. The space experience that comes with the kapidzik has led to different definitions (naming) of the spaces. Accordingly, it is necessary to see events in the context of their scope, since what gives them meaning is the relationships that they establish there Keywords: Tetova, kapijiks, spatial configuration, phenomenology.