A key task for urban planning in Japan is to incorporate agricultural land uses into the urban fabric and statutory planning. This paper analyzes the process whereby “agricultural zones” were incorporated into the planning of Kohoku New Town, a site designed in the 1960s and recognized as a path breaking attempt to include agricultural land in urban development. Our findings draw from key planning documents and from interviews with key actors in the planning of Kohoku New Town. The results indicate that the primary aim of “agricultural zones” was to augment open spaces and that agricultural and urban land uses were comprehensively incorporated into an open space system that included pathways to connect agricultural and residential areas. However, in the final plan released in 1974, the “agricultural zones” were designated solely for industrial agriculture, a shift which can be attributed to the introduction of the “senbiki” system of strictly separating urban and rural areas in the New City Planning Act of 1968. In addition, the pedestrian paths connecting “agricultural zones” and housing areas envisioned in the open space system of earlier planning stages as a means of integrating agriculture and residential development was also abandoned. Thus, the original plans to fuse agricultural and urban development were discarded during the planning process.
