Duvar English | 1/28/2021
Homeowners across Istanbul, including the Tozkoparan neighborhood, are uniting against the city’s urban renewal project, which the government says are meant to increase the city’s resistance to earthquakes. But the project may leave many residents, like 70-year-old Ayşe Yılmaz, out in the cold.
70-year-old Ayşe Yılmaz defied curfew earlier this month in order to spend an hour in the cold waiting for good news. It was mid-day, so the 150 other people gathered in Barış Park in the Tozkoparan neighborhood of Istanbul were mostly housewives and retired people.
Yılmaz, who asked to use a pseudonym, was expecting the city to cut her electricity, water, and natural gas within days via a plan to demolish her building, and 301 others, in order to build ones more resistant to earthquakes.
The septuagenarian owns her apartment, but would be required to pay for a remodeled one in the new building. With only enough money to sustain her for the next two months because of medical bills for her cancer treatment, Yılmaz says she will not budge from her home.
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Naomi Cohen | journalist 