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Description
Public spaces are often conceptualized through notions of accessibility, continuity, and structured use. However, the dynamics of urban life are equally shaped by interruptions, unexpected encounters, and shifts in rhythm. This paper examines passageways as a spatial and social phenomenon that disrupts urban continuity, generating alternative public interactions and micro-transformations in everyday life. Specifically, it focuses on Büyük Beşiktaş Çarşısı (BBÇ). By engaging with Benjamin’s montage principle, the concept of stumbling as a productive rupture, and Buck-Morss’s critique of capitalist urbanism, this study highlights the transformative power of passageways as counter-sites within the city.
Public spaces are not neutral; they are shaped by contestation, negotiation, and power asymmetries (Lefebvre, 1991). Passages have historically functioned as urban generators, serving as both connectors and independent microcosms of urban life. Their permeability and adaptability allow them to host a range of socio-spatial practices, from informal economies to subversive urban movements. However, as Buck-Morss (2010) argues, modern capitalist urbanization increasingly produces self-contained, large-scale urban structures that prioritize efficiency and control, suppressing the unpredictability of public life. While contemporary urban megaprojects tend to reinforce rigid spatial orders and social stratification, the persistence of passages suggests an enduring urban desire for informality, local traditions, and contingent spatial experiences (Smith, 1995; Imai, 2018). This paper investigates the ways in which passageways-situated between street networks and enclosed architectural structures-resist homogenization by fostering unexpected social encounters, collective agency, and alternative urban rhythms.
BBÇ, as a multi-entrance passage with a porous architectural form, provides an ideal case study for understanding how urban thresholds can act as sites of transformation. Unlike enclosed shopping malls or gated spaces, passages such as BBÇ introduce a form of stumbling-a momentary rupture in the expected flow of urban movement. This stumbling effect creates temporal and spatial intervals that can generate new social possibilities. The act of moving through a passageway can similarly challenge dominant spatial logics. Instead of merely facilitating movement, passageways momentarily suspend it, creating gaps in which urban subjects must renegotiate their interactions with the space and with each other.
This montage-like structure of passages also produces a form of grafting, where diverse urban practices intersect and hybrid social configurations emerge. As Imai (2018) notes, such urban thresholds reflect a broader tension between decay and renewal, informality and regulation, collective memory and emerging urban conditions.
Unlike enclosed shopping malls or gated spaces, passages such as BBÇ introduce a form of stumbling-a momentary rupture in the expected flow of urban movement. This stumbling effect creates temporal and spatial intervals that can generate new social possibilities, enabling alternative forms of civic engagement and public agency. As negotiated spaces, passageways exist in a constant state of contestation between formal governance and informal appropriation, state planning and local adaptation, control and resistance. While some passageways remain inclusive urban commons, others face increasing privatization, reducing their accessibility and reinforcing spatial exclusions. Yet, the ability of passageways to foster unscripted encounters, informal economic activities, and collective reappropriations highlights their potential as sites of spatial democracy in the city.
This paper contributes to the discussion on public spaces as agents of transformation by positioning passages as urban voids that foster hope through their capacity for openness, resistance, and reinvention. As Istanbul undergoes rapid urban change, understanding the role of passages in sustaining collective urban agency becomes increasingly critical. Rather than viewing them merely as residual spaces, this study argues for recognizing passageways as productive interruptions in the urban fabric-spatial conditions that enable alternative civic formations and reimagine the possibilities of public life.
References
Benjamin, W. (1936). "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction", 217-251; Ed. H. Arendt, (2007). Illuminations, Schocken Books, Amerika Birleşik Devletleri.
Benjamin, W. (1999). The Arcades Project, The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, ABD.
Buck-Morss, S. (2010; ©1991). Görmenin Diyalektiği – Walter Benjamin ve Pasajlar Projesi, Çev. F. B. Aydar, Metis Yayınları, İstanbul.
Imai, H. (2018). Tokyo Roji: The Diversity and Versatility of Alleys in a City in Transition, Routledge, New York.Lefebvre, H. (1991; ©1974). The Production of Space, Çev. D. Nicholson-Smith, Blackwell, Oxford.
| Keywords | public space, passageways, urban continuity, Istanbul, stumbling, grafting |
|---|---|
| Best Congress Paper Award | Yes |
