Koray Çetin Önalan, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Chamber of Geological Engineers Izmir Branch, made evaluations regarding the durability of buildings in Türkiye against earthquakes. Önalan stated that the earthquakes that occurred recently in the Eastern and Southeastern Anatolia regions caused anxiety among the people of the region, and said that the earthquakes in question were of magnitudes that did not have a destructive effect. Önalan said, "In developed countries, no one is very worried about earthquakes with a magnitude of around 5. In Türkiye, the threshold of destruction in earthquakes is very low. Since earthquakes with a magnitude of around 6 are on our threshold of destruction, we wonder 'Will there be destruction?' in every kind of earthquake." "We are worried," he said.
'NO CITY IS 100 PERCENT READY FOR DISASTER'
Expressing that in Türkiye, it is not urban transformation, but building transformation, Önalan said, "One building in the street is demolished and a new building is built in accordance with earthquake regulations. Not the street, but the building is transformed. Transforming a few buildings in the street does not make that street or the city to a greater extent prepared for an earthquake. Urban transformation should be carried out with a different logic. It should not be urban transformation, but urban change. We need to make the city resistant to all disasters as a whole. The transformation needs to be done on an island basis. "Preparing for disasters is possible by planning with its infrastructure and surroundings. It needs to be planned in three parts: before the disaster, during the disaster and after the disaster. We cannot say that not only Izmir, but also any city in Türkiye is 100 percent ready for disasters," he said.
'THE CITY CANNOT BE MADE RESILIENT BY TRANSFORMING 3-5 BUILDINGS EVERY MONTH'
"Izmir's infrastructure does not support the population," said Önalan, adding, "In a city with enough infrastructure for 1 million people, 3.5 million people live in the metropolitan area. The city's resistance to earthquakes and disasters will always be questioned due to population density. We need to make long-term plans and go for urban change. The city does not support the population."
Stating that 33 million people live on the coastline from Istanbul to Antalya in Türkiye, and 30 million of them live in the city center, Önalan said, "The countryside in Türkiye has been abandoned. We need to strengthen the countryside now. It is not something that will happen in a short time, it needs to be implemented without compromising with a serious 30-year projection so that we can create cities that are truly resistant to disasters. Otherwise, with this logic, we will only transform buildings. We are talking about more than 300 thousand buildings that need to be transformed in Izmir." "The city cannot be made earthquake resistant by transforming 3-5 buildings every month," he said.
'NATURAL EVENTS WILL CONTINUE TO RETURN TO IZMIR AS DISASTER'
Emphasizing that institutions should also be ready for earthquakes, Önalan said, "We cannot manage the earthquake, we need to manage the disaster. In Izmir, the Metropolitan Municipality closed down an extremely vital unit such as the Engineering Geology Branch Directorate and transferred its responsibilities to the Ground Investigation Branch Directorate, which is only a sub-branch of engineering geology. This is not acceptable. We see that the Metropolitan Municipality does not act seriously about disaster preparation and earthquake preparation, and does not take this job seriously. We need to make plans in our institutions first in terms of disaster preparation. "This is what we did not do. Therefore, every natural event will continue to return to Izmir as a disaster from now on," he said.
