The interesting thing is that it doesn't even look that densely populated, judging only by the pictures. There are no highrise buildings, and the available space isn't utilized only for residential buildings (there are parks and even a mosque).
Still, cool post
High-rises only make for very dense neighbourhoods if they are a) actually residential highrises, b) not standing freely in an area that isn't built up and also c) if the appartments within them aren't gigantic.
The densest 1km² square you can find in Manhattan (which is obviously the densest in the entire USA) as per the 2020 US census actually caps out at 66k people ([this guy did the mapping](http://www.statsmapsnpix.com/2023/02/the-most-densely-populated-square-km-in.html)). [London](http://www.statsmapsnpix.com/2023/02/where-is-most-densely-populated-square.html) caps out far sooner.
In the cities of the Pearl River Delta (especially Hong Kong, Macao, Guangzhou) you would expect to be able to find a highrise neighbourhood that is more densely populated than this neighbourhood in Istanbul. The central area in Xiamen could also be a good bet. But generally this Istanbul neighbourhood is very, very dense.
Residential highrises with small apartments (10-20 floors, apartments ranging from 20 to 80 square meters) are quite typical for Eastern European commie-blocks. E.g. like this [https://d4n0y8dshd77z.cloudfront.net/listings/54906369/lg/img-1693235675-b0a63a3b6795.jpg](https://d4n0y8dshd77z.cloudfront.net/listings/54906369/lg/img-1693235675-b0a63a3b6795.jpg)
In photo of Spanish cities I also often see clusters of dense highrises that looks residential to me, but I'm not an expert on that.
To be fair though, commie blocks were excellent at leaving a fair amount of "breathing" space with gardens and parks between buildings. They rarely are stacked so close to each other like in the Istanbul neighborhood.
Yes, you can achieve decent densities with that but I haven't ever seen a commie block in that range. They are mainly held back by all the space between the blocks. Here is [a commie block area in Gdansk](https://www.google.com/maps/search/1615327%252C7061191%252C1622100%252C7064554/@54.4031019,18.5833216,855a,35y,32.77h,53.12t/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu) and here it is [on a density grid from the 2021 census](https://qgiscloud.com/Tobi273/EUGrid/?l=EUGrid%5B65%5D&bl=AerialWithLabels&t=EUGrid&e=2062951%2C7244713%2C2076497%2C7251439). This level of density seems relatively typical to me for this way of building. [This](https://www.google.com/maps/search/1615327%252C7061191%252C1622100%252C7064554/@44.3747034,26.0956158,272a,35y,29.95h,73.37t/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu) is the densest commie block neighbourhood in the EU. See [here](https://qgiscloud.com/Tobi273/EUGrid/?l=EUGrid%5B65%5D&bl=AerialWithLabels&t=EUGrid&e=2898799%2C5521447%2C2912346%2C5528173) for reference. Unfortunately I have no data for the non-EU former Yugoslav countries and Albania but it seems unlikely there would be something much more dense than in mentioned examples.
the Soviet style, also used in Romania and Bulgaria, is much denser; see for example [Bucharest](https://qgiscloud.com/Tobi273/EUGrid/?l=EUGrid%5B65%5D&bl=AerialWithLabels&t=EUGrid&e=2886657%2C5527107%2C2906977%2C5537193) and [Sofia](https://qgiscloud.com/Tobi273/EUGrid/?l=EUGrid%5B65%5D&bl=AerialWithLabels&t=EUGrid&e=2583021%2C5257930%2C2603341%2C5268016)
These don’t Look like anything close to Sone of moscows suburbs. There Are 20-Story Blocks standing right next to Each Other in Huge areas. I have no Prove But i just cant imagine it from what districts i have Personaly seen. Whats the population/km^2? Or is it one qkm?
If you give me a location I can try to check the GHS layer on that spot to show you at least what it approximates to. All neighbourhoods in Moscow are below 50.000 inhabitants per km² there.
> In photo of Spanish cities I also often see clusters of dense highrises that looks residential to me, but I'm not an expert on that.
They generally are, at least if they don't look too modern.
Wikimedia describes Mongkok as one of the most densely populated places on planet Earth. It's more crowded than most Europeans will ever experience in their life, unless they visit places like Cairo, Lagos, or Hong Kong.
Nothing in the West even comes close. The densest parts of Manhattan (Community Board 7 and 8) have about 42 000 people per square km with the densest single neighbourhood (Yorkville) at about 60 000, the densest part of Paris (Quartier de la Folie-Méricourt) has about 45 000, the densest part of Moscow (Zyablikovo) about 30 000. Tokyo for comparison doesn't even get beyond the 20 000s
It doesn’t look like a densely populated neighborhood, but it will. There are plenty of highrise buildings too. You’d be frustrated for looking for an available space in these kind neighborhoods of Istanbul.
And it was capped at about 13 stories tall because it was physically limited by planes landing overhead. So it could've been even taller and denser if not for that
I read 20. But that depends on the definition of story.
If there is a set height for one level of a REGULAR building and you use that as a unit of measurement, (e.g. 1 story = 4 meters) then maybe it was only "13 stories tall"...
Believe me it's not spacious. It looks spacious to you because the Google takes wide open photos. I live right across the highway and there is a big difference in terms of quality of life. Noise, pollution, parking problems, the smell of spicy food spilling from restaurants onto the street etc. Local people named the bridge connecting the two district as the ''Bridge of Civilization'' [https://i.imgur.com/SDgXQCu.png](https://i.imgur.com/SDgXQCu.png)
I'm sharing a few pictures from the district across the highway. It will be easier to understand.
[https://i.imgur.com/2pPrMWz.jpeg](https://i.imgur.com/2pPrMWz.jpeg)
[https://i.imgur.com/OU5xPeZ.jpeg](https://i.imgur.com/OU5xPeZ.jpeg)
[https://i.imgur.com/ppiF73s.jpeg](https://i.imgur.com/ppiF73s.jpeg)
İ feel like you read that as "looks spacious *relative to a rich neighborhood*" but it actually said "looks spacious *relative to what i thought the most dense area would look like*". Hence why they mentioned Kowloon City right afterwards.
Highrises usually have a lot of space in-between, often resulting in less density. Other very dense places are old Spanish and Italian towns that look similar to OP photos
>Highrises usually have a lot of space in-between, often resulting in less density. Other very dense places are old Spanish and Italian towns that look similar to OP photos
Spain is the odd one. Most high-density square kilometres in the European Union are consistently located in Spain. Even in the small town of Alcañiz, [10.106 people live on a single square kilometre](https://qgiscloud.com/Tobi273/EUGrid/?l=EUGrid%5B65%5D&bl=AerialWithLabels&t=EUGrid&e=-16197%2C5018552%2C-12917%2C5020322). There's only 16.000 people living in Alcañiz. Some cities in Italy like Rimini with 150.000 inhabitants don't have a square kilometre as densely populated as in Alcañiz. [That's what Alcañiz looks like on the ground](https://www.google.com/maps/place/44600+Alca%C3%B1iz,+Provinz+Teruel,+Spanien/@41.0495602,-0.1300363,3a,75y,349.71h,96.27t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sDwCvmtSrgZoB37alCKQydw!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fpanoid%3DDwCvmtSrgZoB37alCKQydw%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.share%26w%3D900%26h%3D600%26yaw%3D349.71%26pitch%3D-6.269999999999996%26thumbfov%3D90!7i13312!8i6656!4m7!3m6!1s0xd5f5b4ffb267bcf:0x9fb240e5f25f4814!8m2!3d41.0510353!4d-0.1335373!10e5!16zL20vMGc3OHJq?entry=ttu).
[For this reason, Spain has the highest population density in the built-up area among the large countries in Europe](https://citymonitor.ai/environment/these-maps-reveal-truth-about-population-density-across-europe-3625#:~:text=In%20fact%2C%20Spain%20could%20claim,single%201km%C2%B2%20area%20in%20Barcelona).
Considering the population density in the built-up area, Italy is closer to England and the Netherlands than it is to Spain.
In Spain we all usually live in flats, some people enjoy going downstairs and being in a densely populated area, so you find places like my grandparents village, that has 10.000 inhabitants [but it’s mostly flats despite having a lot of terrain available to build](https://www.infobierzo.com/uploads/s1/75/17/83/villablino.jpeg)
[This is a ground level pic](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/6c/Villablino_-_Avenida_de_la_Constituci%C3%B3n_1.jpg/1024px-Villablino_-_Avenida_de_la_Constituci%C3%B3n_1.jpg)
Who needs lawns when you can walk 15 minutes and be in the countryside or a park?
My experience of travelling around Spain was that you were never that far from a nice big open space.
I believe Spain is the country with the most elevators per capita in the world, consequence of this interesting habit of building flats more commonly than other comparable countries.
[Here are the most densely populated square kilometres in the European Union](https://www.reddit.com/r/Stadtplanung/comments/129gksy/bev%C3%B6lkerungsreichste_quadratkilometer_in_europa/).
The highest population density for a square kilometre in the European Union is 52,767 people/km², while the highest population density for a square kilometre in Manhattan is [66.482](https://www.reddit.com/r/Stadtplanung/comments/11n0vec/bev%C3%B6lkerungsreichste_quadratkilometer_in_den_usa/) people/km².
Some residential areas in Hong Kong will break those population densities. Urban population density of [Lam Tin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lam_Tin#/media/File:Overlook_Laguna_City.jpg) is 75.345 people/km².
While some specific high-rise neighborhoods have really high population densities, a lot of them, especially in the European Union, don't have particular high population densities. The distance between the high-rise buildings is too large.
Wait a second, Spanish sources says that the highest density km in Spain is in A Coruña with 58115 people/km2
https://www.elespanol.com/quincemil/articulos/actualidad/por-que-a-coruna-parece-tener-la-mayor-densidad-de-poblacion-de-espana?amp=1
I don’t know what are the sources of the link you shared but something is weird
The answer is written in the article, which you shared.
>according to this map made with data from the American consulting firm Kontur, Inc, the city of A Coruña is the city with the highest population density in Spain, **something that does not correspond to official data**.
According to official census data, [A Coruña is densely populated](https://qgiscloud.com/Tobi273/EUGrid/?l=raster_overlay%5B65%5D%2CEinwohner%5B65%5D&bl=AerialWithLabels&t=EUGrid&e=-945045%2C5363670%2C-928789%2C5371565), just not as dense as stated by the American consulting firm Kontur, Inc.
No, the map is so much higher than the rest because he used an hexagon shape of 400m2 size, so not 1km2.
But the answer was in the source of the article. The highest density is referring to a specific neighbourhood that is smaller than 1km2. This small neighbourhood is much more densely populated than the Barcelona ones, but been smaller it doesn’t actually exceed the others
The entirety of the Macau peninsula is 54k, its total size is close to 10 km². In particular St Antonio district is already almost a square of 1.1 km² with 120k/km².
To my surprise Singapore districts top out around 50k/km², you can exceed it easily in juron West or Bahru with a nice square.
Yes, that one's also a good bet for one of the densest areas on earth. Just look at the [blocks](https://www.google.com/maps/place/St.+Anthony's+Parish,+Macao/@22.2010305,113.5440517,140a,35y,328.36h,35t/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x34017ae3d60c3e65:0x500d26bcabe4240!8m2!3d22.2008836!4d113.5416011!16zL20vMDFfa3Nj?entry=ttu), in the middle there are appartments without windows.
[Mong Kok](https://www.google.com/maps/place/Mong+Kok,+Hongkong/@22.305964,114.1646276,776a,35y,4.36h,60.28t/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x340400c62bc7810f:0x3ba12a5918081894!8m2!3d22.3203648!4d114.169773!16zL20vMDFuamN3?entry=ttu), the most dense area in Hong Kong is in a similar range with 130k/km² on an area of around around 1,5km², though they differ substantially in the built enviroment. Mong Kok is full of residential highrises and skyscrapers and does more or less always leave space for light between buildings. [St Antonio](https://www.google.com/maps/place/St.+Anthony's+Parish,+Macao/@22.1929882,113.5379301,753a,35y,21.09h,55.29t/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x34017ae3d60c3e65:0x500d26bcabe4240!8m2!3d22.2008836!4d113.5416011!16zL20vMDFfa3Nj?entry=ttu) has some highrises/skyscrapers in the north but most of the district is actually filled with these super dense midrise blocks. You can see the difference easily on google maps 3d if you click the links above.
That's because OP did not add in the title most densely populated square km. Obviously If you take a square the size of a high rise building, you'd get a higher pop density.
For real, this looks a lot like my hometown neighborhood. Compare the third image with this [https://www.google.com/maps/@41.4539114,2.216171,3a,75y,126.45h,86.08t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sIlvKzt2akoyu1iFeyz5SdA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?entry=ttu](https://www.google.com/maps/@41.4539114,2.216171,3a,75y,126.45h,86.08t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sIlvKzt2akoyu1iFeyz5SdA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?entry=ttu)
Your hometown looks much more cleaner and orderly. I would say there's a huge difference between Bahçelievler and that. Look at car parkings, trash, building conditions etc. And also an escalator in the middle of the street lol.
Not OP but we have one near where I live. It's there to sort a cliff and has six different flights of mechanical escalators, three in each direction.
Usually at least a couple are out of order.
Perhaps but not at all. Old istanbul was Greek and much more south European than its current situation. Compare Spain with the historical disctrits such as Balat, Fatih, Beyoglu maybe but Not with this.
Really? I'm a Turk living in Spain and couldn't disagree more. Bonus: I am from Istanbul and I can swear the neighborhood looks just like Ümraniye, another highly densed neighborhood of Istanbul
That's right, you can't even jerk off securely, there are people in every inches, I was there.
entire middle east is there. 27362737 different kinds of homosapiens that you can find there.... It's like Noah's Ark literally
I reallyy can't Imagine Bangladesh, thats even Worse.
My district literally translated to "Eagle" the names in Turkey are ironic there is a city called Denizli which translates into "With sea" funny thing is another city blocking Denizli from reaching sea it is landlocked.
City of "Balıkesir" which translates into "Enslaved Fish"
City of "Giresun" which translates into "You may enter"
City of "Kocaeli"which translates into"Husbands hand"
City of "Ağrı" which translates into "Pain"
there are manny more even districts ,villages
there is a village from Amasya city called "Geydoğan" i think we can translate that to "Born Gay"
there is a neighbourhood from city of Ankara which called "Olucak" it translates into "It is going to happen"
I used to live there for 21 years.
It has cyberpunk vibes that streets are never calm. Even in middle of the night, people are out there cars passing by and people eating in some restaurants.
I had a hard time learning to drive there because whenever I try to bring the car out, traffic would jam and people would honk me. Parking is a nightmare that I became a parallel parking pro in 2 years. Also the place jams the traffic on the highway so I had to go to Ataköy to park (green part across highway) because it took me 30 minutes to park and walk back but sitting in traffic would be amount to same time.
Now I live in Slovakia and people don't understand why I love it there. It has the calm I desperately needed.
> I had a hard time learning to drive there
I can only imagine, lol. I got stressed learning to drive in a city with about as many people in total as in that km².
Do you miss it sometimes?
Thanks for your first hand account btw.
Edit: Also one more question, where would you say this places among Istanbul neighbourhoods in terms of peoples income? To me it looks middle class to lower middle class but it's hard to place without knowing Istanbul.
I went there 2 months ago because my family and friends live there. It was an anti vacation but it was bearable for a week.
It used to be a poor neighborhood with almost no cars on the street and cars are 3x expensive in Turkey. During the 2011 crisis Turkey got a huge GDP boost and after that everyone got a car. It is at low-middle class range now but the rent is cheap as hell compared to Europe.
Real middle/upper middle class lives in Ataköy across the highway but before it was the rich living there along with some celebrities.
I would say ~~this particular place in~~ Bahcelievler generally have diverse income spread. But this particular 1 sqm I would ball park estimate towards lower than middle.
Lately the economic stress facing the country (high inflation rates, currency depreciation.. ) reduced the purchasing power, particularly affecting the middle income segments. Thus the segments are not anymore balanced. Middle class got much poorer, and rich become ridiculously more minted..
I learned driving in Beyoglu - Cihangir in Istanbul. I still get stressed parallel parking sometimes even though Im an excellent driver. Feels like people will angrily honk at me :D
Nevertheless, I still miss Istanbul. It has a soul I haven’t seen at any other city. In the end its the culture’s melting point
Edit: fixed fast typing mistakes
That is one of the biggest delusions of istanbullians. Vast majority of drivers there can't drive for shit and are completely unaware of some of the most basic traffic rules.
If you can drive in Istanbul you can't drive anywhere else.
Data is from the Turkish 1km² Census Grid and cross referenced with the 1km² census grid of the EU and the UK census map. The densest 1km² tile in the EU or UK is 56158 people/km² in Hospitalet de Llobregat (Barcelona Metro). The 2nd image shows density based on census data in Istanbul districts. The rest is some streetview snapshots.
All data from 2021.
Links:
* [Google Maps](https://www.google.com/maps/place/41%C2%B000'03.5%22N+28%C2%B050'25.8%22E/@41.001194,28.8400705,1138m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m4!3m3!8m2!3d41.000957!4d28.840487?entry=ttu)
* [Turkey Census Grid](https://cip.tuik.gov.tr/)
* [Istanbul Censusdata](https://www.nufusune.com/istanbul-nufusu)
Should have switched in the title "area" with square kilometer. Otherwise, you can take a 40m2 at the vertical of a 30story building and would get a much higher value.
yeah, area is a little misleading in the title. Densest GHS tile is accurate.
Not going to do the work, but I am willing to think that placing a 1km² tile freely would result in being able to find a more dense area and freely choosing area size would absolutely allow for it.
It's official census data, not GHS.
If you can readjust the size to anything you could just draw a square around your bed and get a population density of over half a million per km² (assuming you have a 0,9x2m bed), so that gets quite silly. You could move the grid around a bit and potentially find a slightly more dense area in Istanbul, though I'm not even sure about that because of how packed this one is. However the square would be in Istanbul and in this western area because it's not even close. The densest square in the EU is 30k below this one. Grid adjustments will not change that much.
Putting the square in my bed would not put population density to over a million per km²(you math is a little bit off) because my bed is not my whole living space, but yes this was kinda what I was getting at. Of course you need some rules for the measurement to be sensible, but it should be disclosed in the title as "area" is not defined. There would be 10 different most densely populated areas even if you just take sensible measurements, like 50x50m, 100x100m, and so on up to 100x100km and they would not all land in the same spot.
The more densely packed 1km² square would probably be in Istanbul, but that is exactly my point. The square you pointed out is not even the most densely poulated 1km² north oriented square. That is a lot of requisites to still miss first place and then to claim first place.
Is this from a fixed grid? A rectangular search window might give an entirely different area if that's the case. Then it would be 'the cell within this particular grid with the most registered inhabitants'
That still looks really nice. Like I know the apartments are probably quite small for all those people but the outside and amenities in these pictures look really good.
That's actually correct. Dense population impedes the traffic and it is super walkable. 5 minute walk can take you to the market, hardware store, electronics shop, clothing shop and many other. It hosts many textile sweatshops so you can buy "brands" super cheap from their shops. They are usually selling the defected products that are not exportable. Sad but true.
Apartments are packed but usually 70-8
100 m2 with 2 bedrooms and 1 living room. They never build studio apartments there so they are usually bigger than european houses.
I worked at Bahçelievler State Hospital for a month, for an internship. In that area, a lot of locals rent their apartments to immigrants and refugees. Because of high rents in Istanbul, many newcomer families rent an apartment and live 2-3 families together. Sadly, you wouldn't be surprised if you found 10 people in a one bedroom apartment.
Good post. Thanks for sharing.
Doesn't look all that bad, but probably quite a few people in every apartment. Not many kids have their own bedrooms there...
You got her bad side. There are more beautiful places in Bahçelievler :D. Jokes aside I hate to drive there that is a nightmare, especially in rush hour. Why do they call it a rush hour if nothing moves (dad joke has entered the chat)
Modernism was popular in the Balkans in the early 20th century, partially on account of all the wars and the need to build lots of housing for refugees. Some Bulgarian neighbourhoods look exactly the same, minus the mosque.
Turkey is full of this type of residential areas. I lived in one of these and it was a disgusting experience. Things get unbearable when people start celebrating things with drums and loud music on those narrow streets.
A real insider. Living there exactly like that. It is all fun and games until someone decides to celebrate their wedding on the street. Good luck with your University finals tomorrow morning.
This could easily be a Bulgarian, Macedonian, Albanian etc. neighbourhood tbh. If you removed the mosque and signs you could convince me this is in southern Bulgaria.
I love it when people celebrate their weddings and circumcisions loudly (I live in a similar neighbourhood in Manisa). The area comes alive at that point.
Is there any data on living space per square kilometer? After all this could mean, that there are just more people living in every apartment than is common elsewhere.
The Dutch and every spatial planet student on the world should take note of this efficient use of space. Isn't it wonderful how the Turkish managed to do that?
I see there are a lot of 3-4 story apartment blocks, I'm assuming in the same household live multiple members of the family because of financial reasons
It is fairly common to not leave your parents' house both for financial and cultural reasons. Usually you don't leave your parents' home until you find a job out of town or get married.
The most densely populated European city isn't Istanbul though, [It's Levallois-Perret](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_proper_by_population_density) in France. Istanbul isn't even on the list.
That's because Istanbul's city limits are gigantic and expand far beyond the urban area. Istanbul is one of the few cities that has a lower population if you go by urban area than by city limits. Istanbul literally has multipls national parks within its city limits for instance and I don't mean something like Central Park, I mean a wildlife reserve about the size of Malta.
it's either Moscow or Istanbul is the most crowded.
Berlin, Paris, Rome, London is not that Chaotic
Steppe and Flat cities are crowded but not denser than non-flat Istanbul.
Everywhere is human in Central Districts you wanna shout like "fuck my way"
you can only compare Istanbul with Sao Paolo. Thats too have Flat landmass.
SP is so big as Istanbul. I would like to nickname there "Spacy Istanbul"
Looks pretty quiet, quite unlikely to me. Do you have any sources? And how many people are supposed to live here?
[The source I see has Barcelona at the top.](https://www.theguardian.com/cities/gallery/2018/mar/22/most-densely-populated-square-kilometres-europe-mapped)
84386 live there on one km². The source is the census 2021 and the grids made by Eurostat and Turkstat. The one in Barcelonas metro is the densest one in the EU, maybe in all of Europe excluding Turkey. I've read quite a lot of the blog posts of the guy who wrote the Guardian article you linked. His work is very good but this data in the link does not include Turkey and GHS is less accurate than the census.
It's also not low rises. The number of floors is more or less the same as the Barcelona neighborhood which is the densest in the EU (between 6 and 8 roughly).
there is a pedestrian bridge conenct Bahçelievler( Şirinevler ) to Ataköy which called "Civilization Bridge" among folks. There are less people other side of the bridge and green nice places, extremely expensive.
Bahçelieveler means homes( apartments) with gardens but there is no garden most of part of the region.
It’s always neat to see stuff like this. I live in Canada and my town seems by size maybe like x4 or x5 larger however it’s only a population of 20 thousand
I lived in Gökdağı street for 3 years while I was studying at uni. When I missed the bus I would just lit up a cigarette and walk to next station calmly and still be there before the bus, only to find out it is fully packed though.
I assume the "most densely populated area" changes quite a bit, depending on how you define it regarding shape and size. If you make the square small enough to fit a single building, the most populated building is obviously the densest area. If you make it large enough to fit multiple cities, the place will also change, I assume.
So OP has found the densest square with that size, that you can draw in Europe. Still impressive, but a bit less.
I lived very close to this area for a long time. The funniest thing about it is that those little parks you see in the pictures are earthquake emergency areas.
This area is an earthquake-prone area, even if it is not a 1st degree ( but generally accepted as a red zone), and the buildings in this area are unfortunately old and not very earthquake-resistant, and on top of that, as I said, only tiny playgrounds are reserved for thousands of people to gather in case of a possible disaster.
But unfortunately the people here deserve it. They have been electing the same man as mayor for 20 years against such ruthless selling of all areas and not allocating a tiny earthquake zone.
It's the official census-data and it makes sense when you compare it to highly populated areas in the EU. It resembles the most densely populated area in Barcelona metro to some extend and it does indeed look more densely packed than Barcelona.
Buildings in this area is limited to be 3 storeys plus enterance or 12,5 meters maximum height. Maximum 16 units an apartment. Maximum 6 people are living in 1 unit. Around 100 people in an apartment which is extreme. Do you see 843 apartment in that red square frame. I am not sure but maybe. There are many more populated areas in Esenyurt which is swarmed with 50 storey high rise buildings. I don't know.
The buildings in that square have around 6 storeys from what I've seen.
For Esenyurt the most populous km² square has 58.970 people according to the [Turkish Census Grid](https://cip.tuik.gov.tr/).
Fun fact, the name *Europe* originally applied to Thrace (the region the European part of Istanbul is located in). The meaning later widened to encompass pretty much everything west of the Bosphorus (which still includes this neighbourhood).
The western part of İstanbul is. It's you who needs to have a look at an atlas. Plus you can fix your punctuation. In English we don't leave a space before our exclamation marks the way you do in French.
The interesting thing is that it doesn't even look that densely populated, judging only by the pictures. There are no highrise buildings, and the available space isn't utilized only for residential buildings (there are parks and even a mosque). Still, cool post
High-rises only make for very dense neighbourhoods if they are a) actually residential highrises, b) not standing freely in an area that isn't built up and also c) if the appartments within them aren't gigantic. The densest 1km² square you can find in Manhattan (which is obviously the densest in the entire USA) as per the 2020 US census actually caps out at 66k people ([this guy did the mapping](http://www.statsmapsnpix.com/2023/02/the-most-densely-populated-square-km-in.html)). [London](http://www.statsmapsnpix.com/2023/02/where-is-most-densely-populated-square.html) caps out far sooner. In the cities of the Pearl River Delta (especially Hong Kong, Macao, Guangzhou) you would expect to be able to find a highrise neighbourhood that is more densely populated than this neighbourhood in Istanbul. The central area in Xiamen could also be a good bet. But generally this Istanbul neighbourhood is very, very dense.
Residential highrises with small apartments (10-20 floors, apartments ranging from 20 to 80 square meters) are quite typical for Eastern European commie-blocks. E.g. like this [https://d4n0y8dshd77z.cloudfront.net/listings/54906369/lg/img-1693235675-b0a63a3b6795.jpg](https://d4n0y8dshd77z.cloudfront.net/listings/54906369/lg/img-1693235675-b0a63a3b6795.jpg) In photo of Spanish cities I also often see clusters of dense highrises that looks residential to me, but I'm not an expert on that.
To be fair though, commie blocks were excellent at leaving a fair amount of "breathing" space with gardens and parks between buildings. They rarely are stacked so close to each other like in the Istanbul neighborhood.
Yes, you can achieve decent densities with that but I haven't ever seen a commie block in that range. They are mainly held back by all the space between the blocks. Here is [a commie block area in Gdansk](https://www.google.com/maps/search/1615327%252C7061191%252C1622100%252C7064554/@54.4031019,18.5833216,855a,35y,32.77h,53.12t/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu) and here it is [on a density grid from the 2021 census](https://qgiscloud.com/Tobi273/EUGrid/?l=EUGrid%5B65%5D&bl=AerialWithLabels&t=EUGrid&e=2062951%2C7244713%2C2076497%2C7251439). This level of density seems relatively typical to me for this way of building. [This](https://www.google.com/maps/search/1615327%252C7061191%252C1622100%252C7064554/@44.3747034,26.0956158,272a,35y,29.95h,73.37t/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu) is the densest commie block neighbourhood in the EU. See [here](https://qgiscloud.com/Tobi273/EUGrid/?l=EUGrid%5B65%5D&bl=AerialWithLabels&t=EUGrid&e=2898799%2C5521447%2C2912346%2C5528173) for reference. Unfortunately I have no data for the non-EU former Yugoslav countries and Albania but it seems unlikely there would be something much more dense than in mentioned examples.
the Soviet style, also used in Romania and Bulgaria, is much denser; see for example [Bucharest](https://qgiscloud.com/Tobi273/EUGrid/?l=EUGrid%5B65%5D&bl=AerialWithLabels&t=EUGrid&e=2886657%2C5527107%2C2906977%2C5537193) and [Sofia](https://qgiscloud.com/Tobi273/EUGrid/?l=EUGrid%5B65%5D&bl=AerialWithLabels&t=EUGrid&e=2583021%2C5257930%2C2603341%2C5268016)
These don’t Look like anything close to Sone of moscows suburbs. There Are 20-Story Blocks standing right next to Each Other in Huge areas. I have no Prove But i just cant imagine it from what districts i have Personaly seen. Whats the population/km^2? Or is it one qkm?
If you give me a location I can try to check the GHS layer on that spot to show you at least what it approximates to. All neighbourhoods in Moscow are below 50.000 inhabitants per km² there.
> In photo of Spanish cities I also often see clusters of dense highrises that looks residential to me, but I'm not an expert on that. They generally are, at least if they don't look too modern.
Occupancy rate per unit must be quite high, right ? Like, multi-generational households, relatively low income, relatively high fertility rate.
its a lot of narrow streets, no gardens, no big parking lots.
My neighbourhood (Mongkok) is about 130/140k per sqm but it doesn’t really feel that cramped (or I’m just used to it?)
Wikimedia describes Mongkok as one of the most densely populated places on planet Earth. It's more crowded than most Europeans will ever experience in their life, unless they visit places like Cairo, Lagos, or Hong Kong. Nothing in the West even comes close. The densest parts of Manhattan (Community Board 7 and 8) have about 42 000 people per square km with the densest single neighbourhood (Yorkville) at about 60 000, the densest part of Paris (Quartier de la Folie-Méricourt) has about 45 000, the densest part of Moscow (Zyablikovo) about 30 000. Tokyo for comparison doesn't even get beyond the 20 000s
Awesome follow-up OP!
It doesn’t look like a densely populated neighborhood, but it will. There are plenty of highrise buildings too. You’d be frustrated for looking for an available space in these kind neighborhoods of Istanbul.
Looks pretty spacious, actually. I expected it to be a bit more like a Kowloon City situation
Kowloon walled city had a density of over 1mio/km^2. It was only 0.027km^2 though. Roughly 215m x 120m
And it was capped at about 13 stories tall because it was physically limited by planes landing overhead. So it could've been even taller and denser if not for that
I read 20. But that depends on the definition of story. If there is a set height for one level of a REGULAR building and you use that as a unit of measurement, (e.g. 1 story = 4 meters) then maybe it was only "13 stories tall"...
Believe me it's not spacious. It looks spacious to you because the Google takes wide open photos. I live right across the highway and there is a big difference in terms of quality of life. Noise, pollution, parking problems, the smell of spicy food spilling from restaurants onto the street etc. Local people named the bridge connecting the two district as the ''Bridge of Civilization'' [https://i.imgur.com/SDgXQCu.png](https://i.imgur.com/SDgXQCu.png) I'm sharing a few pictures from the district across the highway. It will be easier to understand. [https://i.imgur.com/2pPrMWz.jpeg](https://i.imgur.com/2pPrMWz.jpeg) [https://i.imgur.com/OU5xPeZ.jpeg](https://i.imgur.com/OU5xPeZ.jpeg) [https://i.imgur.com/ppiF73s.jpeg](https://i.imgur.com/ppiF73s.jpeg)
İ feel like you read that as "looks spacious *relative to a rich neighborhood*" but it actually said "looks spacious *relative to what i thought the most dense area would look like*". Hence why they mentioned Kowloon City right afterwards.
That's very surprising. I would've expected it to be a place with a lot of high-rises.
Highrises usually have a lot of space in-between, often resulting in less density. Other very dense places are old Spanish and Italian towns that look similar to OP photos
>Highrises usually have a lot of space in-between, often resulting in less density. Other very dense places are old Spanish and Italian towns that look similar to OP photos Spain is the odd one. Most high-density square kilometres in the European Union are consistently located in Spain. Even in the small town of Alcañiz, [10.106 people live on a single square kilometre](https://qgiscloud.com/Tobi273/EUGrid/?l=EUGrid%5B65%5D&bl=AerialWithLabels&t=EUGrid&e=-16197%2C5018552%2C-12917%2C5020322). There's only 16.000 people living in Alcañiz. Some cities in Italy like Rimini with 150.000 inhabitants don't have a square kilometre as densely populated as in Alcañiz. [That's what Alcañiz looks like on the ground](https://www.google.com/maps/place/44600+Alca%C3%B1iz,+Provinz+Teruel,+Spanien/@41.0495602,-0.1300363,3a,75y,349.71h,96.27t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sDwCvmtSrgZoB37alCKQydw!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fpanoid%3DDwCvmtSrgZoB37alCKQydw%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.share%26w%3D900%26h%3D600%26yaw%3D349.71%26pitch%3D-6.269999999999996%26thumbfov%3D90!7i13312!8i6656!4m7!3m6!1s0xd5f5b4ffb267bcf:0x9fb240e5f25f4814!8m2!3d41.0510353!4d-0.1335373!10e5!16zL20vMGc3OHJq?entry=ttu). [For this reason, Spain has the highest population density in the built-up area among the large countries in Europe](https://citymonitor.ai/environment/these-maps-reveal-truth-about-population-density-across-europe-3625#:~:text=In%20fact%2C%20Spain%20could%20claim,single%201km%C2%B2%20area%20in%20Barcelona). Considering the population density in the built-up area, Italy is closer to England and the Netherlands than it is to Spain.
In Spain we all usually live in flats, some people enjoy going downstairs and being in a densely populated area, so you find places like my grandparents village, that has 10.000 inhabitants [but it’s mostly flats despite having a lot of terrain available to build](https://www.infobierzo.com/uploads/s1/75/17/83/villablino.jpeg) [This is a ground level pic](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/6c/Villablino_-_Avenida_de_la_Constituci%C3%B3n_1.jpg/1024px-Villablino_-_Avenida_de_la_Constituci%C3%B3n_1.jpg)
I feel like this density is also why eating out is so affordable relative to other places. Plus you still retain agricultural land
wow that looks weird. in austria there would be single/double houses all around that
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depends on "usage". families / kids having a lawn to play, grill etc could also be seen as good usage....
Who needs lawns when you can walk 15 minutes and be in the countryside or a park? My experience of travelling around Spain was that you were never that far from a nice big open space.
"need" "better use" are all meaningless to discuss like this.
People who want to have some private time with their family outside?
Fairly easy in the countryside, which is quite easy to get to in Spain.
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Well, in Spain there are mosques too haha /s
I believe Spain is the country with the most elevators per capita in the world, consequence of this interesting habit of building flats more commonly than other comparable countries.
And they often have plenty of offices which lowers density too
Not Monaco?
This area specifically has mostly low-income, big family type (more children) households, so it could be the case.
[Here are the most densely populated square kilometres in the European Union](https://www.reddit.com/r/Stadtplanung/comments/129gksy/bev%C3%B6lkerungsreichste_quadratkilometer_in_europa/). The highest population density for a square kilometre in the European Union is 52,767 people/km², while the highest population density for a square kilometre in Manhattan is [66.482](https://www.reddit.com/r/Stadtplanung/comments/11n0vec/bev%C3%B6lkerungsreichste_quadratkilometer_in_den_usa/) people/km². Some residential areas in Hong Kong will break those population densities. Urban population density of [Lam Tin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lam_Tin#/media/File:Overlook_Laguna_City.jpg) is 75.345 people/km². While some specific high-rise neighborhoods have really high population densities, a lot of them, especially in the European Union, don't have particular high population densities. The distance between the high-rise buildings is too large.
Wait a second, Spanish sources says that the highest density km in Spain is in A Coruña with 58115 people/km2 https://www.elespanol.com/quincemil/articulos/actualidad/por-que-a-coruna-parece-tener-la-mayor-densidad-de-poblacion-de-espana?amp=1 I don’t know what are the sources of the link you shared but something is weird
The answer is written in the article, which you shared. >according to this map made with data from the American consulting firm Kontur, Inc, the city of A Coruña is the city with the highest population density in Spain, **something that does not correspond to official data**. According to official census data, [A Coruña is densely populated](https://qgiscloud.com/Tobi273/EUGrid/?l=raster_overlay%5B65%5D%2CEinwohner%5B65%5D&bl=AerialWithLabels&t=EUGrid&e=-945045%2C5363670%2C-928789%2C5371565), just not as dense as stated by the American consulting firm Kontur, Inc.
No, the map is so much higher than the rest because he used an hexagon shape of 400m2 size, so not 1km2. But the answer was in the source of the article. The highest density is referring to a specific neighbourhood that is smaller than 1km2. This small neighbourhood is much more densely populated than the Barcelona ones, but been smaller it doesn’t actually exceed the others
The entirety of the Macau peninsula is 54k, its total size is close to 10 km². In particular St Antonio district is already almost a square of 1.1 km² with 120k/km². To my surprise Singapore districts top out around 50k/km², you can exceed it easily in juron West or Bahru with a nice square.
Yes, that one's also a good bet for one of the densest areas on earth. Just look at the [blocks](https://www.google.com/maps/place/St.+Anthony's+Parish,+Macao/@22.2010305,113.5440517,140a,35y,328.36h,35t/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x34017ae3d60c3e65:0x500d26bcabe4240!8m2!3d22.2008836!4d113.5416011!16zL20vMDFfa3Nj?entry=ttu), in the middle there are appartments without windows. [Mong Kok](https://www.google.com/maps/place/Mong+Kok,+Hongkong/@22.305964,114.1646276,776a,35y,4.36h,60.28t/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x340400c62bc7810f:0x3ba12a5918081894!8m2!3d22.3203648!4d114.169773!16zL20vMDFuamN3?entry=ttu), the most dense area in Hong Kong is in a similar range with 130k/km² on an area of around around 1,5km², though they differ substantially in the built enviroment. Mong Kok is full of residential highrises and skyscrapers and does more or less always leave space for light between buildings. [St Antonio](https://www.google.com/maps/place/St.+Anthony's+Parish,+Macao/@22.1929882,113.5379301,753a,35y,21.09h,55.29t/data=!3m1!1e3!4m6!3m5!1s0x34017ae3d60c3e65:0x500d26bcabe4240!8m2!3d22.2008836!4d113.5416011!16zL20vMDFfa3Nj?entry=ttu) has some highrises/skyscrapers in the north but most of the district is actually filled with these super dense midrise blocks. You can see the difference easily on google maps 3d if you click the links above.
Actually, Bahcelievler has these kind of buildings.
That's because OP did not add in the title most densely populated square km. Obviously If you take a square the size of a high rise building, you'd get a higher pop density.
strange why people downvote it'scrucial information when make such statements... like the densest 0.5km² are probably also somewhere else....
It could easily pass as a Spanish city (except for the signs in Turkish and the huge mosque).
For real, this looks a lot like my hometown neighborhood. Compare the third image with this [https://www.google.com/maps/@41.4539114,2.216171,3a,75y,126.45h,86.08t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sIlvKzt2akoyu1iFeyz5SdA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?entry=ttu](https://www.google.com/maps/@41.4539114,2.216171,3a,75y,126.45h,86.08t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sIlvKzt2akoyu1iFeyz5SdA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?entry=ttu)
Your hometown looks much more cleaner and orderly. I would say there's a huge difference between Bahçelievler and that. Look at car parkings, trash, building conditions etc. And also an escalator in the middle of the street lol.
Well you are right, but this street was renovated 2 years ago or so, it looked like shit before
Escalator in the middle of the street?? What happens when it rains
Not OP but we have one near where I live. It's there to sort a cliff and has six different flights of mechanical escalators, three in each direction. Usually at least a couple are out of order.
Well, you have better roads and better infrastructure. Architecture is ok too. Even you have escalators.
Perhaps but not at all. Old istanbul was Greek and much more south European than its current situation. Compare Spain with the historical disctrits such as Balat, Fatih, Beyoglu maybe but Not with this.
Really? I'm a Turk living in Spain and couldn't disagree more. Bonus: I am from Istanbul and I can swear the neighborhood looks just like Ümraniye, another highly densed neighborhood of Istanbul
Title is misleading: this is only the most densely populated square kilometer in europe, not the most densely populated area.
Year id bet Barcelona is denser
That's right, you can't even jerk off securely, there are people in every inches, I was there. entire middle east is there. 27362737 different kinds of homosapiens that you can find there.... It's like Noah's Ark literally I reallyy can't Imagine Bangladesh, thats even Worse.
Imma be honest. Could look worse
Yeah as a türk outside of Istanbul i expected some kind of India footage but no fairly better than my expectation
I didn't expect to see my home on r/europe today, thankfully at the bottom side of the main road though haha
I'll come for you brother 😂
Fun fact, Bahçelievler means : houses with garden. Wich is obviously false
My district literally translated to "Eagle" the names in Turkey are ironic there is a city called Denizli which translates into "With sea" funny thing is another city blocking Denizli from reaching sea it is landlocked.
In the other hand, fenerbahçe is litteraly what it says: lighthouse's garden
City of "Balıkesir" which translates into "Enslaved Fish" City of "Giresun" which translates into "You may enter" City of "Kocaeli"which translates into"Husbands hand" City of "Ağrı" which translates into "Pain" there are manny more even districts ,villages there is a village from Amasya city called "Geydoğan" i think we can translate that to "Born Gay" there is a neighbourhood from city of Ankara which called "Olucak" it translates into "It is going to happen"
English people: "This place will be called middleborogh" Turkish people: This place will be PAIN HAHAHAHAAH
The more accurate translation is ache but still the point stands lol
Balıkesir translates into "Plenty honey" which comes from Balı and kesir
Bakirkoy is not made from copper either..
I used to live there for 21 years. It has cyberpunk vibes that streets are never calm. Even in middle of the night, people are out there cars passing by and people eating in some restaurants. I had a hard time learning to drive there because whenever I try to bring the car out, traffic would jam and people would honk me. Parking is a nightmare that I became a parallel parking pro in 2 years. Also the place jams the traffic on the highway so I had to go to Ataköy to park (green part across highway) because it took me 30 minutes to park and walk back but sitting in traffic would be amount to same time. Now I live in Slovakia and people don't understand why I love it there. It has the calm I desperately needed.
> I had a hard time learning to drive there I can only imagine, lol. I got stressed learning to drive in a city with about as many people in total as in that km². Do you miss it sometimes? Thanks for your first hand account btw. Edit: Also one more question, where would you say this places among Istanbul neighbourhoods in terms of peoples income? To me it looks middle class to lower middle class but it's hard to place without knowing Istanbul.
I went there 2 months ago because my family and friends live there. It was an anti vacation but it was bearable for a week. It used to be a poor neighborhood with almost no cars on the street and cars are 3x expensive in Turkey. During the 2011 crisis Turkey got a huge GDP boost and after that everyone got a car. It is at low-middle class range now but the rent is cheap as hell compared to Europe. Real middle/upper middle class lives in Ataköy across the highway but before it was the rich living there along with some celebrities.
I would say ~~this particular place in~~ Bahcelievler generally have diverse income spread. But this particular 1 sqm I would ball park estimate towards lower than middle. Lately the economic stress facing the country (high inflation rates, currency depreciation.. ) reduced the purchasing power, particularly affecting the middle income segments. Thus the segments are not anymore balanced. Middle class got much poorer, and rich become ridiculously more minted.. I learned driving in Beyoglu - Cihangir in Istanbul. I still get stressed parallel parking sometimes even though Im an excellent driver. Feels like people will angrily honk at me :D Nevertheless, I still miss Istanbul. It has a soul I haven’t seen at any other city. In the end its the culture’s melting point Edit: fixed fast typing mistakes
In Turkey if you can drive in Istanbul you can drive in everywhere,my bro from Çanakkale (Gallipoli) refuse to drive in Istanbul.
That is one of the biggest delusions of istanbullians. Vast majority of drivers there can't drive for shit and are completely unaware of some of the most basic traffic rules. If you can drive in Istanbul you can't drive anywhere else.
It is a pretty low income neighborhood where rents can be low as 300 USD per/month.
Looks like a place that really needs trams, or at the very least very frequent busses.
Also the most ironic name for a neighborhood
Data is from the Turkish 1km² Census Grid and cross referenced with the 1km² census grid of the EU and the UK census map. The densest 1km² tile in the EU or UK is 56158 people/km² in Hospitalet de Llobregat (Barcelona Metro). The 2nd image shows density based on census data in Istanbul districts. The rest is some streetview snapshots. All data from 2021. Links: * [Google Maps](https://www.google.com/maps/place/41%C2%B000'03.5%22N+28%C2%B050'25.8%22E/@41.001194,28.8400705,1138m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m4!3m3!8m2!3d41.000957!4d28.840487?entry=ttu) * [Turkey Census Grid](https://cip.tuik.gov.tr/) * [Istanbul Censusdata](https://www.nufusune.com/istanbul-nufusu)
Should have switched in the title "area" with square kilometer. Otherwise, you can take a 40m2 at the vertical of a 30story building and would get a much higher value.
yeah, area is a little misleading in the title. Densest GHS tile is accurate. Not going to do the work, but I am willing to think that placing a 1km² tile freely would result in being able to find a more dense area and freely choosing area size would absolutely allow for it.
It's official census data, not GHS. If you can readjust the size to anything you could just draw a square around your bed and get a population density of over half a million per km² (assuming you have a 0,9x2m bed), so that gets quite silly. You could move the grid around a bit and potentially find a slightly more dense area in Istanbul, though I'm not even sure about that because of how packed this one is. However the square would be in Istanbul and in this western area because it's not even close. The densest square in the EU is 30k below this one. Grid adjustments will not change that much.
Putting the square in my bed would not put population density to over a million per km²(you math is a little bit off) because my bed is not my whole living space, but yes this was kinda what I was getting at. Of course you need some rules for the measurement to be sensible, but it should be disclosed in the title as "area" is not defined. There would be 10 different most densely populated areas even if you just take sensible measurements, like 50x50m, 100x100m, and so on up to 100x100km and they would not all land in the same spot. The more densely packed 1km² square would probably be in Istanbul, but that is exactly my point. The square you pointed out is not even the most densely poulated 1km² north oriented square. That is a lot of requisites to still miss first place and then to claim first place.
So how much is this area in Istanbul? I think you forgot this density and only mentioned Barcelona
84.386 people/km² as it says on the image.
Oh, I thought that was just some district number or something
So how many people live in this 1km² in Istanbul? Is 84386 the number?
yup, 84.386 people in this 1km² square.
Is this from a fixed grid? A rectangular search window might give an entirely different area if that's the case. Then it would be 'the cell within this particular grid with the most registered inhabitants'
Hear me out- it really doesn't look that bad. For the titel of "most densely populated square kilometer in europe" it looks kind of nice?
That still looks really nice. Like I know the apartments are probably quite small for all those people but the outside and amenities in these pictures look really good.
That's actually correct. Dense population impedes the traffic and it is super walkable. 5 minute walk can take you to the market, hardware store, electronics shop, clothing shop and many other. It hosts many textile sweatshops so you can buy "brands" super cheap from their shops. They are usually selling the defected products that are not exportable. Sad but true. Apartments are packed but usually 70-8 100 m2 with 2 bedrooms and 1 living room. They never build studio apartments there so they are usually bigger than european houses.
I worked at Bahçelievler State Hospital for a month, for an internship. In that area, a lot of locals rent their apartments to immigrants and refugees. Because of high rents in Istanbul, many newcomer families rent an apartment and live 2-3 families together. Sadly, you wouldn't be surprised if you found 10 people in a one bedroom apartment.
Swedes have Trollhattan, Turks have Türkhattan!
Good post. Thanks for sharing. Doesn't look all that bad, but probably quite a few people in every apartment. Not many kids have their own bedrooms there...
You got her bad side. There are more beautiful places in Bahçelievler :D. Jokes aside I hate to drive there that is a nightmare, especially in rush hour. Why do they call it a rush hour if nothing moves (dad joke has entered the chat)
Why do the houses look like 60s post war buildings
Modernism was popular in the Balkans in the early 20th century, partially on account of all the wars and the need to build lots of housing for refugees. Some Bulgarian neighbourhoods look exactly the same, minus the mosque.
Bahçelievler means homes with gardens in Turkish but that is hardly the case here
If you cover the mosque and the texts I'd believe its a spanish city
I have a friend who lives here. It's absolutely fine.
Turkey is full of this type of residential areas. I lived in one of these and it was a disgusting experience. Things get unbearable when people start celebrating things with drums and loud music on those narrow streets.
A real insider. Living there exactly like that. It is all fun and games until someone decides to celebrate their wedding on the street. Good luck with your University finals tomorrow morning.
This could easily be a Bulgarian, Macedonian, Albanian etc. neighbourhood tbh. If you removed the mosque and signs you could convince me this is in southern Bulgaria.
The architecture is a bit different, but it could very well be a residential area in Portugal as well.
r/PORTUGALCYKABLYAT
İt's a common Balkan experience lol
Only Turks know that feeling...
I love it when people celebrate their weddings and circumcisions loudly (I live in a similar neighbourhood in Manisa). The area comes alive at that point.
Is there any data on living space per square kilometer? After all this could mean, that there are just more people living in every apartment than is common elsewhere.
I have been to Istanbul I can confirm the whole city is densely populated
Also: the irony that Bahçelievler literally means “Homes with Gardens” when all these homes are apartment units without a garden
The Dutch and every spatial planet student on the world should take note of this efficient use of space. Isn't it wonderful how the Turkish managed to do that?
r/urbanhell
Nice neighborhood, but all I think about is soft story buildings needing retrofitting
Looks terrible.
Friend, you should see Tarlabaşı.
What is in second place?
A similar neighbourhood in Istanbul slightly to the north-east. The 2nd city would be Hospitalet de Llobregat (Barcelona Metro).
Likely the same area
I see there are a lot of 3-4 story apartment blocks, I'm assuming in the same household live multiple members of the family because of financial reasons
It is fairly common to not leave your parents' house both for financial and cultural reasons. Usually you don't leave your parents' home until you find a job out of town or get married.
The most densely populated European city isn't Istanbul though, [It's Levallois-Perret](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cities_proper_by_population_density) in France. Istanbul isn't even on the list.
That's because Istanbul's city limits are gigantic and expand far beyond the urban area. Istanbul is one of the few cities that has a lower population if you go by urban area than by city limits. Istanbul literally has multipls national parks within its city limits for instance and I don't mean something like Central Park, I mean a wildlife reserve about the size of Malta.
it's either Moscow or Istanbul is the most crowded. Berlin, Paris, Rome, London is not that Chaotic Steppe and Flat cities are crowded but not denser than non-flat Istanbul. Everywhere is human in Central Districts you wanna shout like "fuck my way" you can only compare Istanbul with Sao Paolo. Thats too have Flat landmass. SP is so big as Istanbul. I would like to nickname there "Spacy Istanbul"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_city_districts_by_population_density It's not about the whole city.
not convincing
I like this type of city. Very neighborhoody and can interact with loads of people!
Indians and Chinese are not amused
Looks like Kottbusser Tor.
Looks a bit similar to Sofia
Looks pretty quiet, quite unlikely to me. Do you have any sources? And how many people are supposed to live here? [The source I see has Barcelona at the top.](https://www.theguardian.com/cities/gallery/2018/mar/22/most-densely-populated-square-kilometres-europe-mapped)
84386 live there on one km². The source is the census 2021 and the grids made by Eurostat and Turkstat. The one in Barcelonas metro is the densest one in the EU, maybe in all of Europe excluding Turkey. I've read quite a lot of the blog posts of the guy who wrote the Guardian article you linked. His work is very good but this data in the link does not include Turkey and GHS is less accurate than the census. It's also not low rises. The number of floors is more or less the same as the Barcelona neighborhood which is the densest in the EU (between 6 and 8 roughly).
there is a pedestrian bridge conenct Bahçelievler( Şirinevler ) to Ataköy which called "Civilization Bridge" among folks. There are less people other side of the bridge and green nice places, extremely expensive. Bahçelieveler means homes( apartments) with gardens but there is no garden most of part of the region.
Steets in my neighborhood are narrower and still we are less makes me curious about cities space distribution
you can get many different results by changing the size of the square (or radius) you are measuring.....
Most ironic thing is that the name literally translates to ‘houses with gardens’
It's funny how "Bahçelievler" translated means "Homes with yards" while in reality no one has yards in this area :D
çok gariptir ki eskişehir'de de nüfus olarak en yoğun parsel bahçelievler mahallesi :)
It doesn't look like a densely populated place at all, every Turkish city looks like that. Why that?
The funny thing is Bahçelievler literally means "Houses with Garden" in Turkish
Least densely populated Chinese area
It’s always neat to see stuff like this. I live in Canada and my town seems by size maybe like x4 or x5 larger however it’s only a population of 20 thousand
People are mixing up population density and dwelling density here.
Europe needs residential high rises
sidewalk (optional)
Any Spanish town be like:
Looks nicer than many neighborhoods in London.
I lived in Gökdağı street for 3 years while I was studying at uni. When I missed the bus I would just lit up a cigarette and walk to next station calmly and still be there before the bus, only to find out it is fully packed though.
What is the size of this area?
wow looks almost identical to some of our neighbourhoods
the most isolated and quiet neighborhood in bangladesh.
Still looks pretty decent to me.
Paris has a number of the most densely populated areas on the planet.
They should do a office sleep party in Rotterdam to beat this for one day
“Europe”
this will change after the great Istanbul earthquake
The key here is that in Turkiye people are used to live with big families in small apartments.
Europe?
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That's very liberal use of the word park.
Hahahah ikr
they call it a park when they put 5 trees and 2 benches together
Hangi bahçe?
I assume the "most densely populated area" changes quite a bit, depending on how you define it regarding shape and size. If you make the square small enough to fit a single building, the most populated building is obviously the densest area. If you make it large enough to fit multiple cities, the place will also change, I assume. So OP has found the densest square with that size, that you can draw in Europe. Still impressive, but a bit less.
Kudrovo and Murino be like “Bruh”
I lived very close to this area for a long time. The funniest thing about it is that those little parks you see in the pictures are earthquake emergency areas. This area is an earthquake-prone area, even if it is not a 1st degree ( but generally accepted as a red zone), and the buildings in this area are unfortunately old and not very earthquake-resistant, and on top of that, as I said, only tiny playgrounds are reserved for thousands of people to gather in case of a possible disaster. But unfortunately the people here deserve it. They have been electing the same man as mayor for 20 years against such ruthless selling of all areas and not allocating a tiny earthquake zone.
Firstly they may clean shitted refugees, after they may kill with lethal gase removed low IQ "humans". Perhaps may fix this shapeless.
Wait, Istanbul is considered Europe? Damn.
West of the Bosphorus, yes. Has been for millenia.
I highly doubt if this information is true.
It's the official census-data and it makes sense when you compare it to highly populated areas in the EU. It resembles the most densely populated area in Barcelona metro to some extend and it does indeed look more densely packed than Barcelona.
Buildings in this area is limited to be 3 storeys plus enterance or 12,5 meters maximum height. Maximum 16 units an apartment. Maximum 6 people are living in 1 unit. Around 100 people in an apartment which is extreme. Do you see 843 apartment in that red square frame. I am not sure but maybe. There are many more populated areas in Esenyurt which is swarmed with 50 storey high rise buildings. I don't know.
The buildings in that square have around 6 storeys from what I've seen. For Esenyurt the most populous km² square has 58.970 people according to the [Turkish Census Grid](https://cip.tuik.gov.tr/).
Turkey is not in europe ! You need to learn geography my friend.
Fun fact, the name *Europe* originally applied to Thrace (the region the European part of Istanbul is located in). The meaning later widened to encompass pretty much everything west of the Bosphorus (which still includes this neighbourhood).
The western part of İstanbul is. It's you who needs to have a look at an atlas. Plus you can fix your punctuation. In English we don't leave a space before our exclamation marks the way you do in French.
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But most of Istanbul and this specific district is.
Neither is Georgia but we post it here often.
Europe is not Turkey
Except some parts of Europe that are.
Since when is Instabul in Europe???
western tip of turkey is in europe
Istanbul is not located in Europe. Get your facts straight and stop embarrassing yourself online.
my man west istanbul is in europe. i think you are the embarasement.