Abstract
Land utilization confusion in agricultural villages has been grasped mainly as a management problem of agricultural land, thus countermeasures have been formulated mostly from this perspective. However, it is conceivable that no adjustment of the village land base is largely responsible for the confusion that hampers rezoning land into land for housing in agricultural villages.
Consequently, planning and adjustment for expanding the rural settlement area with reference to previous settlement becomes important. The present study evaluates rural settlement area expansion planning using the Kamo area of Gifu Prefecture settlement expansion as an index. There are three village expansion types: Expansion within the settlement area, expansion around the settlement area, and expansion in the settlement area of scattered houses.
1. The trend for village expansion was analyzed to predict a future trend in rezoning land for housing on the basis of previous village expansion and classifing land utilization from the management state of included agricultural land.
2. The inhabitant's intention regarding rural settlement adjustment was analyzed. Their major concerns were the demand for land for housing, content of the rural settlement adjustment and the way agriculture land around the settlement area should be used.
3. A study was made of rural settlement area locating planning for each village expansion type, taking into consideration 2 and 3 above.
4. Conclusion (1) It is desirable that expanding rural settlement areas be planned around the settlement area irrespective of the village expansion type.
(2) Plans for expanding rural settlement areas have problems such as competition between urban and agricultural utilization of land, changes in the village formation and the like. For the former problem, land adjustment based on mutual consent among inhabitants concerning the village land utilization plan and formation of the order of land utilization should be made. For the latter problem, the formation of a separate new community in the village may be necessary according to the circumstances.
(3) Expanding the rural settlement area is classified into the development type and adjustment type. As to adjustment type, the land adjustment scheme is especially important since it makes possible utilization of land for agriculture and housing.
