Abstract

In recent years, the “compact city” concept is gaining popularity as a suitable urban structure for a depopulation society in Japan. Many studies using scenario analysis methods have evaluated ideal compact city scenarios from various points of view including aspects of CO2 emissions, infrastructure maintenance costs, and traffic accessibility. However, actual forms of the compact cities have not been clarified to date. Therefore, it is also necessary to build compact urban scenarios based on residents' intentions. Consequently, this study was undertaken to clarify residents' intentions and preferences for future living environments using a questionnaire survey. Based on those results, one can produce urban structure scenarios incorporating those residents' intentions. This study specifically examines four points of residents' intentions for future life using questionnaire survey results as described below.(1) Place where residents want to live in the future: downtown vs. suburbs More residents want to live in downtown areas than in suburbs. However, differences in preferences are apparent by sex, age, and the place of current residence. Overall, many residents intend to live in downtown areas in the future. However, elderly men who currently live in the suburb are more likely to want to live there in the future. Therefore, one must consider not only future living environments in the downtown area, but also those in suburbs to build a compact city based on residents' intentions.(2) Centrally located facilities of the future Many residents hope that shopping centers will be located in the city center. Some survey respondents also selected the stations and shopping streets. Such facilities that are used frequently can form the center of a compact city.(3) Daily transportation of the future First, the number of retained cars per household and the frequency of present car use were analyzed. Results show that residents in this study area routinely depend on personal automobiles. Second, the desired frequency of cars and transportation use in the future were also analyzed. Age strongly affects the preferred frequency of automobile use. Older respondents show lower rates of intended car use in the future. Among transportation modes, cars are expected to be the most used, followed by “on foot”. Particularly, the response rate for “on foot” was higher among responses of residents who do not expect to use cars in the future.(4) Necessary nearby facilities Residents who want to live in the suburbs expect to need no facilities near their homes in the future. In contrast, residents wanting to live in the downtown area require the several facilities nearby. As basic information for designing a compact city, population densities near some facilities such as supermarkets and clinics were analyzed. Results show that facilities cited for their high necessity are built in areas where the population density is 20-50 persons/ha.

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