Assoc. Prof. MELTEM ŞENOL BALABAN

Biography

Meltem ŞENOL BALABAN, PhD.

She was graduated from the City and Regional Planning Department (CRP) at Middle East Technical University (METU) in 1998 with a Bachelor in City Planning and subsequently did a Master of Science in Urban Design. Dr. Balaban holds two PhD titles. In her City and Regional Planning PhD thesis she focused on flood disaster management in Turkish cities, targeting the associated risks for society and planning processes. In her second PhD in Urban Engineering as a JICA Scholar she developed a GIS-based model for spatial distribution of potential urban spaces used as evacuation and temporary shelter sites and piloted this concept in a case study of a district in Istanbul. Her experience is highly relevant when it comes to applying disaster risk prevention concepts in a very practical way on the municipal level.

After her Bachelor degree Dr. Balaban continued to work in CRP at METU. From 1999-2005 she was employed as Research and Teaching Assistant. During that period, she was seconded as researcher to the German GeoForschungZentrum (GFZ) in Potsdam, where she dedicated herself to urban flood management in mega cities. Since 2005, with some breaks in between, she is working as part-time instructor and (since 2013) as Assistant Professor in CRP at METU. Main focus of her work is on integrating GIS in planning processes, risk management and mitigation planning, urban flood risk management, GIS-based modelling in mitigation planning. Dr. Balaban is very familiar with all relevant national and international DRM methodologies and concepts. She authored a wealth of publications in relevant fields, e.g. the definition of barriers in the Turkish local context as regards climate change adaptation or lessons learnt for resilience in urban planning derived from an assessment of flood risk factors in riverine cities of Turkey, thus providing her with state-of-the-art knowledge and research experience. Since August 2018 she holds the position of Director of METU Disaster Management Implementation and Research Center.