Trimestrale del Laboratorio
Territorio Mobilità e Ambiente – TeMALab
ISSN 1970-9870
Vol 4 – No 3 – settembre 2011 – pagg. 53-63
Dipartimento di Pianificazione e Scienza del Territorio
Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II
© Copyright dell’autore.
It was late April 2011 when the Canal Istanbul Project has been proposed by the Prime Minister (PM) Erdogan. The origins of the canal idea traces back through the 16 th
century, during the Ottoman reign that the PM emphasized in his speech as “… a dream comes true…”
Although an alternative sea route used to be a necessity for the transportation of timbers during the Ottoman Empire, this contemporary project targets great alterations in economic growth and to enhance the strategic position of Turkey in the global arena. The Canal Istanbul Project is grandiose not only because of its objectives, but also of the location choice, the financial model to be used in construction and because it provokes international maritime conventions. Since the facts on the Canal Istanbul Project are just referred to the speech of the PM Erdogan during the election campaign, in this paper, we speculate on the
probable features of the Canal related to the current situation and assets of Istanbul. Next chapter focuses on the scope and motivation of the Canal Istanbul. Hereby, the speech of the PM has been mostly decoded in order to better presume basic reasoning of the canal. The following chapter underlines challenges and limitations on the realization of the project. The chapter four covers several speculations we developed on the implementation
approach of the project. A critical question arises at the chapter five such as “Istanbul will be a winner or loser due to the canal project?”.
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