Regional shopping center's contribution for citizens and local communities in Japan

Abstract

A large-scale shopping center project is no longer approved in the suburban area since the City Planning Law was revised in order to draw facilities such as shopping centers, hospitals or leisure centers back to downtown under the pressure mainly from medium and small retailers located in the central area of cities.
The Suburban large-scale SC has a function as “community”, serves as a facility with public nature and carries out various roles for a local citizen and a local community.
The environment surrounding commerce is undergoing significant alterations due to the change of values and behavior patterns of the local citizens, the improvement of life infrastructure such as roads because of the rapid motorization and the modernization of a retail industry.
Considering the historical changes of SC locations, it is a natural consequence that the places where the cars can access easily are preferred as a SC location. Suburbanization of the SC location is an unstoppable trend of the modern retail industry.
The biggest problem of the revised Act is the lack of a viewpoint of “protection of consumer interests”.
Originally city planning should be the citizen-oriented. It should not be altered or revised due to the pressure from the medium and small sized retailers nor foreign government. It is important to establish different type of attractiveness for city centers and suburban SCs so that the planning can meet the diversified needs of the local citizens.