Public participation in urban transformation projects: The case study in Erenler District of Sakarya Province Urban Transformation Project

Concept of participation is in relation to many other concepts regarding citizens and administrators. In this dissertation, concept of participation is evaluated in terms of citizens' participation to urban planning process. Public participation to planning is an area on which local administrators and urban planners studying in a long period. The article by Arnstein published in 1969, entitled as 'A Ladder of Citizen Participation' is the underlying source of the matter. In Turkey, the Law on the Transformation of Areas Under Disaster Risk, titled with number 6306 and entered into force in 2012 and the regions declared as risky areas in many cities have entered into the process of urban transformation. All relevant actors should be involved in the process in order the urban transformation process to be successful. Of course, the most affected ones of urban regeneration process are the citizens who live in the transformed region. The aim of this study is discuss in detail whether the actors, especially the local public ones, who will be directly affected by the urban transformation process, are able to be actively involved in the process. Selected as the study area, the project of urban transformation in the size of 48.2 hectares in Erenler district of Sakarya province was selected. As a result of the protocol signed with the Ministry of Environment and Urbanization within the scope of the law numbered 6306, Erenler municipality, the project manager, is the first county municipality to carry out the urban transformation project under the related law in Turkey. The data of the study was gathered through semi-structured interviews with district municipalities, neighborhood headmen, consultants and local residents, which are actors of the Erenler Urban Transformation Project. Descriptive analysis technique was used in order to analyze the research data.