The Change of the Urban Structure in the 1920's

Abstract

The case study of the urban development in Osaka city, which was brought by the progress of national products and the change of national industrial structure after World War I, shows us two aspects. The one is expanding in suburb, and the other is accumulating in the center. In view of the urban industrial structure, it means that the factories were constructed in suburb and marchant section developed in the center. At the same time, it means the appearance of the division between the industrial area and the housing area. Among these changes, the most important one is that the weight of the marchant section developed by accumulating. Though the restruction of the urban geographical structure gave the inhabitor further distance to go to job, there were some difficulties for them. Therefore, especially in the center where the marchant section developed acumulately, the housing problems like the shortage of the houses and too expensive rent occurred from 1916 to 1927. The analysis of the house renting market tells us that the demand was much more in the center than in the suburb, although much houses were constructed in the suburb those days. And the people who had small income wanted to get their houses in the center. On the other hand, it was hard for them to pay expensive rent and go to job too far because of small income. And the chances for the income by the members of the family were important for them. So, many chances to get jobs in the center caused the mismatch between supply and demand in the house renting market. By the analysis of the housing problem in 1920's, we can conclude that today's urban structure got to appear after World War I, and it resulted to give a big shock to the society and people those days.