ISTANBUL – Anatolia News Agency
The cultural valuables of Istanbul are now accessible thanks to a website project. The first of its type in Turkey, the website presents 200 years of history. ‘From now on, everyone will be able to reach all kinds of information about Istanbul in a virtual environment. They can develop projects on Istanbul and reveal the city’s culture, cultural industry and tourism policies,’ said Istanbul Culture and Tourism Director Ahmet Emre Bilgili
A project named “Istanbul’s Cultural Heritage and Culture Economy Inventory,” which aims to gather Istanbul’s cultural values under the same roof and present the data for general use in a virtual environment, has been finished. The website www.istanbulkulturenvanteri.gov.tr began to operate Wednesday morning.
At a press conference held Tuesday at Richmond Hotel, Istanbul Culture and Tourism Director Ahmet Emre Bilgili said the project was implemented in collaboration with the Culture and Tourism Ministry, the Turkish Academy of Sciences, or TUBA, and Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality with support from the French Institute of Anatolian Studies and the Istanbul 2010 European Capital of Culture Agency.
“From now on, everyone will be able to reach all kinds of information about Istanbul in a virtual environment. They can develop projects on Istanbul and reveal the city’s culture, cultural industry and tourism policies. This website was one of the biggest deficits of the city,” Bilgili said.
Bilgili said the application was a first in Turkey and very important in the world. “Within the scope of the project, it has been collaborated with 200 institutes and worked with the world’s best experts. This work will be a model for other Turkish cities. If every city takes its own inventory like we did, Turkey’s cultural heritage and industrial inventory will be revealed,” he said.
Bilgili said the inventory would be continuously developed and updated and the real owner of the project would be the Istanbul Governor’s Office and the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality. “The website’s language is only Turkish at the moment, but it will be translated into different languages. Also, 17 books have been prepared for the project and three of them have been published by the Istanbul Bilgi University.”
Dedicated to mankind and the Turkish nation
TUBA President Yücel Kanpolat highlighted the significance of the project, saying that it revealed what Istanbul has and what it doesn’t. He said the project was nonprofit and was dedicated to mankind and the Turkish nation, adding that they would ready to share the project with other countries.
The project’s coordinator Hakan Tanrıöver said the project was completed in 15 months by a 48-person team. “Istanbulkulturenvanteri.gov.tr has 150,000 webpages and 60,000 photos. The data is gathered under six main titles including ‘rural architecture,’ ‘archaeology,’ ‘public culture,’ ‘culture economy,’ ‘maps’ and ‘Istanbul bibliography.’
Tanrıöver said people could follow 200 years of change of the same place since 1776 and all maps were included in the website. “All of Istanbul’s cultural and traditional values have been documented. This is an extraordinary resource for Istanbul lovers and researchers. Also, the records of all books, doctorate and master theses on Istanbul are available on the website, which includes 27,690 structures.”
Sea walls documented for the first time
Tanrıöver said Istanbul’s sea walls were also documented in the inventory for the first time, and they informed the municipality’s relevant department about bad structures around the sea walls.
“The total budget of the project was 1.5 million Turkish liras. One million liras was provided by the Istanbul 2010 Agency and the rest by TUBA and the Culture and Tourism Ministry,” he said.