Abstract
In recent years, automatic driving systems have been developed and their social implementation has been discussed. These new transportation modes are expected to have significant impacts on our lives. In order to examine these impacts, this study focused on the process about the social acceptance of traffic modes in the past. Specifically, by the overview of newspapers, we surveyed various problems related to the traffic about children from the Meiji era (1868-1912) to 1945. As a result, in the Meiji and Taisho (1912-1926) eras, there were enormous traffic accidents which children were involved. Many accidents occurred when children were playing on roads and a half of the traffic fatalities were on children under 14 years old. Originally, roads were supposed to be the place to play for children. However, the rapid implementation of modern transportation modes such as carriages, trains and cars caused many traffic accidents with children. As non-structural measures against these traffic accidents, the government held events to spread “traffic morals” and police banned children from playing on roads. The Road Regulations in 1920 included a section prohibiting children from walking and playing on the street without their parents and this section has been kept to this day. On the other hand, as structural measures, push button signals at crosswalks and parks for children were introduced and temporal car free zones were planned.
