A 35-story half-built hotel in Ankara, which became iconic from a crane left on its roof for decades, has been put up for sale some 21 years after its construction.
The Büyük Çankaya Hotel, first conceived of in the 1980s upon the orders of then coup leader and president, Kenan Evren, was completed in 1994 but never went into operation as the hotel's owner gave up on completing construction as he was frustrated due to a family feud on the ownership of the hotel.
The crane was not removed either due to the cost of taking it off.
Former President Abdullah Gül had requested the removal of the crane on the building near the Çankaya Presidential Palace on the grounds it had a risk of falling down and Çankaya Municipality overseeing the district where the hotel is located, launched a public contract for its removal. As the dispute over ownership was cleared, the impounded property was put up for sale in an auction, from a starting price of TL 159 million ($60.39 million).
