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Grotesque villas in Turkey’s west back on market after official permission
Grotesque villas in Turkey’s west back on market after official permission
Turkish officials have issued a permit to resume the sale of more than 700 château-style residences in western Turkey, which were widely slammed as grotesque and harmful to the environment. Click through for the story in photos...
A lawsuit had been filed against the developers of the Burj Al Babas housing project on grounds that the company destroyed trees and dumped excavated soil on forestland in the district of Mudurnu in the northwestern province of Bolu.
After the construction started in 2011, dozens of villas were sold to mainly Arab investors, but a criminal case was launched in 2016.
Before the project was completed, the construction firm was declared bankrupt in September, leading to a halt of sales.
With the criminal case continuing in the Mudurnu court and the company also appealing the court-declared bankruptcy in Istanbul, the firm’s chairman Mehmet Emin Yerdelen told Demirören News Agency on Jan. 16 that the sale of the villas resumed because the Bankruptcy Directorate allowed it.
“Our companies are currently operating in normal conditions under judicial control. Our sales and construction works continue as part of our resumed commercial activities,” he said.
The Burj Al Babas project of the Sarot Group included 732 villas, a shopping center, a hotel, a mosque and public spaces in the Mudurnu district of the northwestern Bolu province. However, citing its debt burden of $27 million, Sarot Group in June applied to a court in Istanbul to file for concordat in order to restructure its debts with its creditors. The court granted the group a time period of three months.
“But the court now decided on bankruptcy. That was a wrong decision. The total value of the project is about $200 million. We will object to this decision. We still have 250 villas completed and ready to go on sale. Selling only 100 of them would be enough to pay off the debts and complete the project,” Mehmet Emin Yerdelen, the chair of the Sarot Group, told daily Hürriyet.
“We think that we will overcome the crisis in four or five months. We have been planning to open the premises partly in 2019,” he added.
The architecture style of the buildings caused a public outcry on social media especially because of its contrast with the Ottoman-style historical mansions of Mudurnu, a town included in the UNESCO World Heritage Tentative List in 2015 and became a member of the international Cittaslow Movement in 2018.
“There are no such buildings in the history of Mudurnu. If this project becomes realized, the label of Cittaslow will be erased,” said Haydar Büyükelçi, a resident of Mudurnu.
Osman Üstün, a local shopkeeper, agreed with him, saying: “Those château-style villas built for Arab customers do not suit Mudurnu. They spoil the historic fabric.”
But the mayor of Mudurnu, Mehmet İnegöl, disagrees. “The place of the project is in a valley three kilometers far from the district center. It is not possible to see them from here,” he said.
“The population in the district center is about 5,000. There is no youth in the town. The youngest residents are about 60 years old. Investors should be brought here without harming the historical fabric. It has nothing to do with the Cittaslow Movement. The Cittaslow area is a specific small part of the district,” added İnegöl, a member of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP).
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