THE CAPACITY TO ACCEPT BARGE-DWELLERS IN OSAKA PORT, AND THE GEOGRAPHICAL CHARACTERS OF THEIR NATIVE PLACES

Abstract

The writer's motive of this study is to solve the following problems. 1. Why do they have to live on the barge? 2. Is there any principle to determine the capacity in ports ? 3. Why is their number at Osaka Port the greatest in Japn ? 4. What are the geographical characters of their native places ? In summary of the results of this study, the following characters can be found in the relation between she ports and barge-dwellers, as well as in their native places. (1) The facilities of the Japanese ports being so bad, it is an important task for the barge to make up their deficits. But their motion is so slow that boatmen are compelled to live on the barge to make the cargo carrying speedy; it becomes more necessary to live on it with the expansion of barge activity at the ports. (2) A. It is the first fact of the distribution of the barge that there is on barge at the ports where the cargoes amount to less than 100, 000 tons a year (Fig 1). B. The number of the barge-dwellers is very large in the ports supported by a great industrial region (Fig 1). C. The auther considered the capacity of the port to accept the barge-dwellers in relation to three elements: cargoes, big steamer-ships and the length of quays. According to this study, however, these elements have no relation to each other at the small ports, while they can be recognized only in the large ones (Fig. 2, 3, 4). Therefore we can not mention the single element to determine their capacity, but, as the effect of many elements combined, the more the activities of the barges at the ports, increase the greater their capacity becomes, i, e. the number of the barges is larger in the following three cases : the hinterland is grater, the nets of interior rivers run through there, and the industrial area which forms a part of the important hinterland is spread along the coast. (3) The capacity of Osaka Port to accept barge-dwellers is the largest in Japan. The reasons are as follows: the equipment of this port is worse; and moreover, the hinterland along the coast is large; the interior canals develop while the cargoes are of heavy weight, and so on. (4) The native places of the barge-dwellers in Osaka Port are limited to the west of Kinki District on account of the geographical position, and especially it is characteristic that many of them come from the islands of the Setouchi Region. This phenomenon depends not only on the low producing capacity of this region, but the traditional excellence of the carrying trade through Setouchi.