Silivri (ancient Selymbria) is a city and a district in Istanbul Province along the Sea of Marmara in Turkey, outside the urban core of Istanbul, containing many holiday and weekend homes for residents of the city. The largest settlement in the district is also named Silivri.

Silivri is located bordering Büyükçekmece to the east, Çatalca to the north, Çorlu and Marmara Ereğli (both districts of Tekirdağ Province) to the west, Çerkezköy to the north-west (one of Tekirdağ Province) and with the Sea of Marmara to the south. It is with an area of 760 km2 (290 sq mi) the second largest district of Istanbul Province after Çatalca. The seat of the district is the city of Silivri.

The district consists of 8 towns and 18 villages, and its population is 155,923 (2013 census). 75,702 in the city of Silivri, the remaining in the surrounding towns and villages – listed below.

Established in 2008, Turkey’s most modern (and Europe’s largest) prison complex is located 9 km (5.6 mi) west of Silivri.

Holiday Resort

During the summer months, the population increases 4–5 times. Silivri is 67 km (42 mi) far from the city center of Istanbul, and is a popular summer resort for many Istanbul residents with its 45-kilometre-long (28 mi) coast. It is on the highway D.100 and the motorway O-3 E80, which connect Turkey to Europe via Edirne. It takes about an hour and a half to get here from the city so is feasible for use in the summer months as a weekend and holiday retreat, although the road out here is heaving with traffic in summer.

Being so accessible from Istanbul, the Marmara coast has long been used for holidaying by Istanbul’s people. As the city has grown, these facilities have moved further and further away. Once Florya and Yeşilköy were resorts, today it is Tekirdağ and even further. Silivri had its heydey in the 1960s and 1970s as families would come by the busload to complexes of holiday flats that were built on the beach. Most had their own stretch of beach. The Marmara Sea here has suffered from pollution in the 1980s and 1990s but now efforts have been made to clean it up and people do swim. Some of these places have sports centres, discos, go-kart tracks, games rooms for the kids etc. and many Istanbul families have pleasant memories of trips to Silivri in the 1970s and 1980s, sitting on the beach in the summer moonlight while the kids run about until they drop from tiredness. Some still go today. All the facilities are located in the holiday housing area, the town centre of Silivri has little to offer in the way of cinema, theatre or any other cultural amenities.

Now the coast has also been blessed with resort hotels and country clubs with sports facilities including golf courses, horse riding centres and tennis courts, health and conference centers. At weekend the area is crowded with day trippers.

With all this development it is hard to find a stretch of open coastline.

The winter months are cold here, as bitter weather blows across Thrace from the Balkans, and holiday homes in Silivri are not much used from mid-September until May or even June.

Main sights

Silivri Castle
The Anastasian Wall, also known as the Long Walls of Thrace, was constructed by Byzantine emperor Anastasius I (491–518) as part of an additional outer defense system for Constantinople during the 5th century and probably was in use until the 7th century. Comparable only with Hadrian’s Wall in England in its complexity and preservation, the fortification stretches some 56 km from Black Sea coast across the Thracian peninsula to the Sea of Marmara at west of Silivri.
Cistern
Piri Mehmed Pasha Mosque
Uzunköprü (The Long bridge)