Marinas in Turkey
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Turkey boasts of increasingly favored ports of call for international and local yachtsmen. The country's popularity is certainly advantaged by her spectacular coastal straits, a past noted for the rich sea-faring literature, some of whose references are part of the everyday culture, as is the case for the Blue Cruise, and the search for the Golden Fleece. In recent years, modern infrastructure and facilities that are considered as requirements for nautical tourism are also being developed with increasing rapidity and sophistication, catering a whole range of services commonly expected by visitors. Modern services geared to recreational boating reaches back to more than three decades in Turkey and considerable momentum has been accumulated in terms of infrastructure, know-how and human resources, promising a still more active future for the business. Prominent Turkish private sector groups view marinas as an attractive investment that also enhances their prestige, thus have built or acquired one to include in their overall portfolio.
It is noteworthy to recall that apart from the larger installations, there are also countless points of stop and supply along the Turkish shores, which offer the advantages inherent to smaller enterprises, sometimes in a family environment, at the same time as putting the coastal geography to good use.
Marinas in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus While it boasts of two well-integrated marinas (in Girne and Gazimağusa), particular emphasis needs to be put on a number of points in relation to its state of isolation susceptible to evolve in line with the Foreign relations of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and on which political haggling between Turkey and the European Union continues (see subheading below for details).
![A natural marina in [], Datça](../../../../images/local/2/24/Hayıtbükü.jpg)
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[edit] List of marinas in Turkey and the TRNC
There are 22 marinas currently (2006) operational in Turkey and the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, as listed below. Many of these were initially constructed through public investment, and later purchased and fine-tuned by the private sector. The dry dock areas are not included in the capacity counts.
[edit] Profiles of operating companies and their marinas
[edit] Marinas operated by local specialist firms
Alaçatı Marina and İzmir's Levent Marina are operated by a local specialist enterprises and Ataköy Marina by a select yacht club. Alaçatı Marina is located within the compound of the ongoing Port Alaçatı large-scale construction project intended for international holiday home-owners.
[edit] Setur Marinas
Setur is one of the prominent names in Turkey's tourism industry and is part of Koç Holding, Turkey's top conglomerate. The company Setur was founded in 1964 within Koç group in order to operate duty-free shops and expanded into the travel agency business in the 1970's. Its first venture into marina ownership and management was in 1978 with the construction of the marina in Çeşme's Altınyunus tourism complex. Antalya and Finike marinas were initially leased from the respective municipalities in 1991 and 1997, and Ayvalık and Kuşadası marinas were taken over from another company the same year. This was followed in 1998 by the take-over of Kalamış and Fenerbahçe Marinas in İstanbul. The company portfolio was brought to its present state with the purchase of the majority actions of Netsel Marina in Marmaris in 2005, bringing the number of marinas owned and operated to eight. In 2000, the company "Setur Marinas" was set up in order to operate as a legal entity distinct from "Setur" self, which continues to concentrate on the travel agency business. At the same time, the different marinas which were, till then, under the umbrellas of separate companies were united within the single framework of Setur Marinas as based in Kalamış, İstanbul.
[edit] International investments
Port Göcek is managed by the British Camper and Nicholsons (widely recognised to be the world's oldest and most prestigious yachting business name) marina division CNMarinas, in a joint-venture with the owner, Turkey's Turkon Holding. The marina is part of an integrated leisure compound, at the tip of a natural park and complete with a Swissotel and the beach gravel brought over from Canada. In 2006, Camper and Nicholson also won the bid, together with IC Holding, for the completion works and the operating of Çeşme harbour marina [1], and it will be the second built in this city considered as a highly precious part of the whole marina privatization package (Çeşme's present-day marina operated by Setur is situated outside the city, within Altınyunus compound, Turkey's showpiece tourism investment in the 1970's owned today by Yaşar Holding [1]).
[edit] Marinas as prestige investments
Among large Turkish conglomerates which constructed a single marina to date, where arguments of prestige enhancement are undeniably present, the first that can be named is Doğuş Holding's recently-built D-Marin ("D" for "Doğuş") in Bodrum's depending municipality of Turgutreis. In the same vein, Park Kemer Marina in Kemer is owned by Turgay Çiner's Park Group. Yet another example is Martı Marina in Marmaris, which was formerly part of a larger holding that included a vast textile and clothing branch. But since those businesses have been sold in 1999, the marina remains part of the four up-market vacation villages still operated by Turkey's well-known business and politics figure Halit Narin's Martı Group.
[edit] Marinas in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus
There are number of specific points to be addressed in relation to the marinas situated along the shores of Northern Cyprus, such as the need to make a cal in a Turkish port beforehand.
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[edit] Marinas under construction
Turkey's most strategic agenda item in the field of nautical tourism remains the introduction of her Black Sea coast to international yachting and developing this region's virtually unexplored potential. In this perspective, an international conference titled the "Black Sea Symposium" was planned to be held in Rize, under the auspices of ICOMIA and the Turkish Chamber of Shipping, but it has been postponed to 2010, largely due to the lack of preparedness of neighboring Black Sea countries [2]. To date, marina development in Turkey's Black Sea coast, adjusted to serve modern-day Argonauts, lags very much behind Turkey's other regions.
The infrastructure for a 175-boat capacity marina is actually fully laid in Trabzon and Turkey's Ministry of Transport is seeking private investors for the complementary works and the operational commitments. Other investments in the same stage of readiness are the two marinas (500- and 200-boat capacity) within Mersin metropolitan area, two in Antalya Province (Alanya with 425-boat and Gazipaşa with 250-boat capacities), two more tendered and concluded investments in İzmir Province each with 400-boat capacities, in Sığacık and inside Çeşme harbour, and finally two small marinas for up to 100 boats in the district of Burhaniye in the Aegean Sea (neighboring Ayvalık) and in Kumburgaz coast of İstanbul's Silivri district, in the Sea of Marmara [2]. Finally, the compound of İzmir's historic Konak Pier building is intended to be enlarged to include Turkey's largest marina (in Konak district in the heart of İzmir metropolitan area) once the suitable adjacent area is made available. The shopping mall part of Konak Pier is already in service since two years and houses up-market stores.
[edit] See also
- Tourism in Turkey
- Blue Cruise (Mavi Yolculuk)
- Gulet
- Taka
- Foreign purchases of real estate in Turkey
- List of shopping malls in Turkey
[edit] External links
- Turkish Coast Guard Command - pages in English
- Turkish Navy Department of Navigation, Hydrography and Oceanography - Notices to mariners and other information in English
- List of Marinas
- ATM Dalaman Airport Airport Of Turkey
[edit] Footnotes
- ^ To avoid confusion, Altınyunus compound in Çeşme should be well distinguished from the company Marmaris Altınyunus, part of Koç Holding and based in Marmaris which had an initially common background, but is today a totally unrelated business operating two hotels -Mares Hotel in Marmaris and Talya Hotel in Antalya, under franchises by Divan Hotels group. Koç Holding announced putting Mares Hotel on sale in October 2006.
- ^ Turkish Ministry of Transport, General Directorate of Construction
