City profile

Istanbul is the largest Turkish city with an urban population over 15 million. It’s the nation's largest port and commercial hub and is also supported by thriving textiles, food processing, and agricultural industries.

Istanbul has many assets it can leverage, both intellectual and infrastructural, with very strong scores for an educated workforce, good universities, and high flight connectivity to global cities.

The city has managed to transform its international airport into a bustling transit hub and created policies and incentives to boost tourism by leveraging on high transit passenger volume.

Moving forward, the city would benefit from focusing efforts on improving Liveability and Loveability for its locals. While the city is relatively affordable though this is starting to tighten, it could focus on improved access to mobility and greater inclusivity. A key way of enabling this is through participatory planning.

Insight

In Istanbul we have been designing a roadmap for improved participation, aiming to reach a growing and more diverse number of residents. Acting as the Delivery Partner for the Global Future Cities Programme Türkiye, Arup is developing a sound model that works for collective decision making in urban planning by including typically under-represented groups.
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