Street Greening with Extended Potted Plant Management by Neighbors in the Nagono Area, Nagoya, Japan

Abstract

Greening public spaces with potted plants increases the quality of life in densely populated residential areas. The extension of personal property into public spaces indicates the spatial recognition by residents regarding architecture in Japan. Nevertheless, it is still not known exactly how potted plants are distributed and managed, perhaps because of the variations in their placement, which is possible due to their portability and small size. By mapping the placement of potted plants and by interviewing planters, this study investigated the characteristics of potted plant distribution for a variety of road widths and describes how they are managed in the Nagono area of Nagoya, Japan.

The main results were following three points. 1) Potted plants along wider roads were placed farther out (from private land) than those along narrower roads, although the total volume of greenery was the same. Along roads less than 4m wide, most gardeners placed their potted plants either on or outside of private land, but not both. Along roads 4 to 8m wide, gardeners used areas both on and outside of their private land, and where roads were more than 10m wide, they placed more potted plants on the edge of the sidewalks. 2) Gardeners also used the empty alley spaces between buildings for planting to different degrees, depending on traffic density. The portability of plant containers contributed to the flexibility of daily management by neighbors. 3) The number of potted plants sometimes increases or decreases through interactions among neighbors; they give potted plants to each other and move their plants in case of conflicts in spatial management. The daily management of potted plants by neighbors varies depending on the daily habits of residents.

Urban residential greening, such as backyard/frontyard gardening, guerrilla gardening, and urban agriculture, has been a recent focus of urban geography. Residential greening of public spaces serves various purposes and has impacts on both political and ethical issues concerning urban environments. Based on the existing results of geographical studies on these new greening actions and changes in urban structure, further studies and case comparisons of private areas of greenery that extend to public spaces will be needed.