İmamoğlu: Places Said to be Assembly Areas Don’t Have Necessary Physical Qualities

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Metropolitan Mayor of İstanbul Ekrem İmamoğlu answered the questions of İsmail Küçükkaya from Fox TV earlier today (September 27).

Addressing the emergency assembly areas in İstanbul, İmamoğlu said, "In 1999, 470 wide-scale assembly areas were determined, now we have only 77 of them left", and added, "The figures that we have today are the following: It is said that 2,864 parks and similar places across İstanbul have been reported to Disaster and Emergency Authority (AFAD) as emergency assembly areas. These places do not have the necessary qualities of an emergency assembly area. Blaming a particular period is not our aim here".

President and ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) Chair Recep Tayyip Erdoğan made a statement about the 5.8-magnitude İstanbul earthquake yesterday and said, "There are currently tens of thousands of emergency assembly areas announced by the AFAD".

Some highlights from İmamoğlu's statements are as follows:

'I want to talk to President about earthquake'

"Regarding assembly areas... The figure is indicated as 10 thousand 22, school gardens are also added to this 2 thousand 800 [parks].

"Our city is in hot water in terms of emergency assembly areas - full stop. If we do not confess it and do not approach the works from that perspective, then, it means we do favoritism. We have identified 856 new places that can be [defined as] new assembly areas.

"In fact, on a TV program that I attended on monday, I said that I wanted to talk every authority of my country, I sat that I would like to talk to Dear President about the earthquake.

"It is like a hidden agenda. We feel the traffic, we feel the lack of a park, we feel everything. But, we forget about earthquake.

'We made many mistakes'

"What we are interested in more is the building stock of İstanbul. How many risky buildings are there? How can they be reinforced? With what system should we handle the urban transformation? Look, we made so many mistakes. If we do not call a spade a spade, we cannot find solutions.

"We could not reduce the risky building stock of İstanbul. If there is a possibility that a building collapses on our heads, like the one in Kartal, it is quite a grave picture for İstanbul. We encounter such risky areas in several districts of ours everyday.

"There is such a psychology among the public: I applied for zoning amnesty and I have got my registration. As if their buildings were firm. It should not be like that. We need to develop a new urban transformation strategy that will deal with building stock. We have to reinforce the building stock of the city.

'We have to start a mobilization of education'

"Public awareness needs to be raised, primarily in schools, an all houses of worship and public buildings, we have to start a great mobilization of education.

"Taxi drivers and bus drivers need to know what to do. We are all responsible in these areas. The earthquake of İstanbul will not be experienced only in İstanbul. İstanbul is the driving power of Turkey. A dispirited moment of İstanbul will cost Turkey and make Turkey pay prices.

'We lived just another unconscious day'

"We really lived just another very unconscious day. I watched the videos. We all scurried about. Thousands of people fluttered about in corridors. We almost have zero consciousness. Almost no one got earthquake position. I did not see such an image.

"We have to start a process that will include all public institutions. We have to face this. We cannot stick our heads in the sand. We can make İstanbul a less riskier place quickly.

"We were preparing for a workshop in November. We shared it with our governor yesterday ant told him that we should do it together". (TP/SD)