2021 年 8 巻 p. 217-240
In Japan, where many local cities face shrinking issues, it is necessary to research city formation process after World War Ⅱ and consider its characteristics in order to conduct smart shrinking initiatives with Location Optimization Plans enacted since 2014. Therefore, I analyzed influencing factors to urban area formation from the focusses on municipality merger, infrastructure development, railroad and bus service network and Public Housing development, etc. taking four regional Core Cites from 1960s to 2015. In order to grasp urbanized area formation process correctly on more microscopic district level, I adopt population data in Survey Districts for the National Census and in order to clarify the fundamental differences of infrastructure level in urban center, I compared between cities with Postwar Reconstruction Project and those without. Consequently, 1) The population densities of urban areas in regional Core Cities had steadily decreased since 1960. On the other hand, there was clearly a spatial structural difference between the cities with the Postwar Reconstruction Project and those without.
The population densities and the population sizes of station spheres were higher in the cities with the Postwar Reconstruction Project. 2) There was a clear difference in the urban area expansion in the period from the period of high economic growth till the initial Area Classification between the cities with the Postwar Reconstruction Project and those without. 3) The factors of bringing the characteristics of urban area expansion in the period from the initial Area Classification till today (1975 ~ 2015) were the degree of the expansion of Urbanization Promotion Areas and the promotion of Land Readjustment in the suburbs.
