FRESENIUS ENVIRONMENTAL BULLETIN, cilt.28, sa.5, ss.3756-3767, 2019 (SCI-Expanded)
Historical surroundings are places that consist of urban details and building groups which need to be preserved and used due to their physical homogeneity, long history together with cultural, social, economic, archeological and aesthetic values. Places with historical and cultural heritage in rapidly growing and changing cities, lose their unique identities and legibility in time and become a body of undefined locations. Therefore, policies intended to preserve and develop that actively include urban landscape designing in every step, should be planned in historical city centers. The study area was chosen as Sivas (Turkey) due to its rich historical past and urban identity shaped by this history. In this study, 19 historical structures from different periods with various qualities and usages were evaluated. The aim of this study was to preserve the cultural values qualitatively and quantitatively in terms of environment and city, while contributing to tourism. Polls with designated parameters were conducted on specialists; and the contribution of historical surroundings to the urban identity, green areas and city structure were defined. The data gathered from these polls were used in a Q-SORT analysis to evaluate the relationship between historical structures and environment. Another evaluation was done with a SWOT analysis on the contribution of historical structures to the belief and memoir tourism. As a result of this study, differences between study areas in which these 19 historical structures were evaluated and open-green area existence, were identified. Suggestions were given on the preservation and development of the quality and quantity of cultural values with regards to a sustainable environment and urban ecology.