Depending on the construction period, geometrical typology, construction and organization of the structure, element size and construction material of historic monumental structures; constructed with bricks, stones, adobe and mortar, are diverse and very complicated. Structural safety is guaranteed by the codes, guidelines, and specifications for recently constructed concrete and steel buildings, but there is no specific criterion for evaluating the historic monumental buildings. This study presents a scoring system method for classifying the risk level of the historic monumental structures based on visual information. This method is based on the acquisition of visual data of the building by using the developed building inspection form, storage of the acquired data on the web database and evaluation of the risk score of the inspected building automatically by the computer database system.

Considered one of the most important tools of development, education increases the efficiency of society by providing opportunities for people according to their skills. (Özbulut, 1999). Through the implementation of Law No. 4306, which was passed on August 18, 1997 in the Official Gazette, an important reform was carried out by increasing the duration of the compulsory education in Turkey from 5 to 8 years. The transition to the new system emphasized the lack of school buildings, which has become problematic due to rapid population growth and the increasing urbanization rate. An intense effort was put into meeting the needs of this system, and, due to the difficulty of producing different projects for each school, time constraints, staff shortage and funding problems, the production of typical project applications which had been discussed for years came more intensely to the fore. The implementation of school building projects through the initiatives of the Ministry of Education and the help of the architecture faculties of various universities, as well as some consulting firms, and their application on different environmental conditions created many problems during construction. Turkish Procurement Law and the attitudes of local governments in this regard are causing significant losses in terms of time and money on applications. In this research study, the typical elementary school projects that have been revised or designed according to the new education system within the Istanbul City boundaries will be studied and an evaluation regarding the emerging issues related to the implementation phase will be explored.

This study focuses on the early design phase experienced by students in the architectural design studio. The early design phase wherein the first design concepts are created is the most important part of the transformation process which forms the major decisions of design concepts. In the early design phase, the designer begins to produce various concepts based on his/her personal and professional knowledge and experiences. The purpose of this study is to examine how students of architecture transform their knowledge to form their first design decisions in the early design phase. For this purpose, a model that examines the transformation of knowledge by means of analyzing architectural representations produced in the early design phase has been developed. It is composed of stages of (A) Knowledge Acquisition, (B) Synthesis, (C) Analysis, (D) First Design and Evaluation and Stages A, B, C are in relation with cyclical feedback on the first degree. Stages C and D provide data with cyclical feedback on the second degree. The process of the model of early design phase can be explained as follows: 1. WHAT the declarative knowledge groups used in stage (A) are (technical knowledge, theoretical knowledge, environmental knowledge, social knowledge) and HOW procedural knowledge is used. 2. In stage (B), the knowledge to be used in stage (A) is related, whether this relationship is carried out spatially, functionally, symbolically, typologically, technologically, socially or not. 3. In stage (C), the first design solutions demonstrating the relationships detected from stage (B) are produced,whether these solutions are produced analogically, pragmatically, canonically, iconically, integratedly or not. 4. In stage (D), solutions presented in stage (C) are evaluated. Whether these solutions meet the criteria of formal, functional, environmental, spatial and technical evaluation or not is analyzed. The implementation of the proposed model has been fulfilled by a case study. 12 students from Architectural Design Studio 3 at the Department of Architecture at Yildiz Technical University participated in the case study. First findings of the case study have shown that the relation to cyclical feedback presented in the early design phase model is only realized when the acquired knowledge is transformed as much as necessary. Transformation is a determinant only if it creates new knowledge that can be used in the first design product.

Increasing environmental and atmospheric pollution due to urbanization, industrialization and global warming is increasing with every passing day. Life in water, air and on land is threatened by environmental problems and disasters caused by this pollution. In addition to global climate change, changes also occur in urban microclimate and regional heat islands are occurring in urban areas. This dual effect and resulting vicious circle increasingly affect human health and natural life negatively. In this context, urban climate studies have come into question in recent years. Results have showed that increasing numbers of built-up areas are linked toincreases in urban temperature and conversely larger areas of vegetation improve the city’s ventilation and climatic comfort. The İstanbul Metropolitan Area is in a period of regeneration as it attempts to prepare for the expected earthquake and as a result of global dynamics. The resulting massive building campaigns and rapid destruction of green areas have a potential to trigger climatic threats. The effects of vegetation on the urban surface temperature in the İstanbul Metropolitan Area have contributed to the improved health construction strategies. Surface Heat Islands (SHI) and Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) values were determined from remote sensing techniques. The dependent variable is temperature and independent variable is NDVI values and the regression analysis was carried out. Then the heat model for NDVI was established with decision tree. The results of regression analysis were R=0.452; R2= 20%; sig.=0.00 and so the analysis was significant in 95%. As a result of the analysis of the residential area of İstanbul, the difference between the expected temperature of the minimum and maximum vegetation clusters was calculated as 4.24.

Soundscape is a relatively new concept that defines the acoustical environment by the interaction of multiple sound sources and environmental parameters. Soundscape concept treats the sound environment as a multi-dimensional entity, based on the complex interaction between sound source, physical environment and human beings. A method for documenting the sound environment based on sound recordings provides qualitative data while the quantitative data is supplied by conventional acoustic measurements. Acoustical perception; in other words, how a person perceives the sound, is the subject focused on in this method. The review of the related literature shows that there is not a common agreement on t the properties of the subjective and objective data, the methods of data collection and evaluation, or the statistical methods to be used in the correlation. Therefore, a wide-frame study aiming to develop an approach based on soundscape for the evaluation, conservation and rehabilitation of acoustical comfort in urban areas, has been planned and realized. The process followed in this study, on documenting and analyzing the sound environment via sound recordings is presented in this article. Accordingly, the method of deriving the sound recordings which refer to the actual sound environment and confirming their quantitative and qualitative accuracy, are described through field work.