Kamiura is a traditional and natural village with about fifty households and one of thirty-nine districts consisting of Odaka-ku, Minami-Soma City, Fukushima Prefecture. As the area of Kamiura is located within twenty kilo-meters from the nuclear power station accident, it was influenced not by Tsunami but by the evacuation order. Local residents could not live in their hometown for six years after the East Japan Great Earthquake.
The paper makes it clear how houses and barns in such a disaster area, were kept, renovated and reused through the interviews of local residents and filed survey. The situations can be classified into four types other than demolition.
1) A main house is kept and maintained without much repair. When a building was not so damaged by earthquake, its owner could select this choice.
2) A main house is renovated. On this type, many residents have returned or prepare for return. Because they could not use their own house ordinarily, they required to repair them for residential reuse.
3) A main house is rebuilt. This type is also selected when its owner wants to return. As many local residents have strong affection to their original house, they tried to make them renovate. But when buildings were too damaged, they had to rebuild. It means that new houses are under the building code and they may require change from the original one.
4) Only a kind of barn and warehouse is kept in a plot. Those owners often commute from their new residences for agriculture. This activity means that the sufferer can continue one aspect of their original life and that they can contribute to maintain their hometown environment.
The history of Kamiura showed that the social transformation had already happened and influenced each family before the disaster. They started to change their houses and use of their fabrics. Many returners utilized the disaster as an opportunity to customize their house to their current and future lifestyle.
The radioactive pollution especially made young generations lost their will of return. As a result, the ordinary family sometimes divided into some households. Moreover, the radioactive pollution required more than six -year evacuation term. With those backgrounds, intension of return and situations of each family affected how they dealt with their own houses in a way among four types.
Because the public support has been directed to demolish broken houses and has focused on return, the commute activity has been taken place by self-help efforts of afflicted people without official assistance. If we consider the meaning of the commute, our society have to propose the appropriate social system for commuters.
