This paper summarizes an investigation of the selection of structures designated for preservation and plans for presenting the past at a heritage site. Heritage sites created in recent years have multiple purposes, and previous knowledge can be inappropriate in that the plan for a heritage site as a whole determines the selection of structures designated for preservation. In this study, each process associated with selection was analyzed.

Zonohana Park, named after the old elephant trunk-like pier that is preserved on the Yokohama waterfront, is used to illustrate the selection of structures designated for preservation. The park described as “where the port of Yokohama originated” was created through a port redevelopment project in the late 2000s, and therefore it is a representative waterfront heritage site.

During the planning process, the park was given various new roles; for example, it was designated as a symbolic landscape with the ability to attract visitors. It was also described as an open space that could be used for events associated with several new public projects planned by the Yokohama City government, such as the 150th Anniversary of the Opening of the Port of Yokohama. Furthermore, the park was valorized not only historically but also aesthetically and economically. As a result, three points on the selection of structures designated for preservation are specified below.

First, valorization of the heritage site as a whole does not unilaterally determine the valorization of each structure. Second, regarding the selection of structures for preservation, historical valorization cannot have a stronger influence than aesthetic or economic valorization. Third, the influences regarding the selection, content, and basis for historical valorization of a structure designated for preservation can alter as a result of other valorization decisions.

In addition, two conditions of structures intended for preservation at a heritage site created as part of an urban redevelopment are noted. One condition is that the structures should be valorized according to at least two of three criteria: historic; aesthetic; and economic. The other is that the structures should not negatively affect the economic value of the urban redevelopment plan.

As described above, aesthetic and economic valorization played a collective role in the urban redevelopment plan that shaped Zonohana Park; additionally, historical valorization was carried out to avoid interfering with aesthetic and economic valorization. During the creation of the heritage site, plans to feature certain aspects of the past in the park were not rigid; rather, they were used as malleable resources that could be shown and sifted out according to various criteria at any time. Such flexibility in the approach to presenting the past brings fluidity to the selection of structures designated for preservation.

This paper discusses the factors underpinning the failure of traditional institutions in an industrial district and their subsequent effect on the development and sustainability of an historical industrial district using the example of the timber industrial district in Osaka during the period 1868–1926. Recent economic geography literature advocates that under the influence of a cultural transition in the modern capitalist age, the economy should be embedded in the society with a focus on social institutions that have positively influenced economic performance in urban industrial districts. However, social institutions have also been known to influence industrial districts negatively. Thus, it is important to elucidate the factors preventing institutions from developing in an industrial district.

The findings of this study are summarized as follows. The timber industrial district in central Osaka had a multicore structure. In particular, Nishinagahori Street comprised traditional institutions that regulated the timber product trade in Osaka. From the 17th century to the late 19th century, Nishinagahori Street prospered as the center of the timber product trade. The institutions and their practices remained intact even after the Meiji Restoration of 1868. However, in the early 20th century, numerous timber traders set up new businesses in the waterfront area, drastically modifying the timber product distribution channel in Japan. Consequently, a conflict emerged between traditional institutions and the newly established trade association. For example, new traders and suppliers of timber products outside Osaka wanted improvements in traditional institutions, which were unfair to new entrants in Osaka’s timber market. This led to an adversarial relationship between the traditional and new traders, which Osaka’s timber trade association failed to resolve. Consequently, numerous timber traders moved from Nishinagahori Street to the waterfront area.

The findings highlight two factors that prevented the development of the industrial district. The first was a system design failure that led to conflicts between traditional institutions and the formal trade association, and the second was the high entry barriers in the traditional timber trade institutions. This study emphasizes the importance of the relationship between traditional communal institutions and formal institutional designs for the development of an historical industrial district.

Studies on the external geometry of detrital particles are subject to controversy. This paper reviews the history of detrital grain shape analysis, particularly “roundness”, since the first half of the 20th century and within various fields, e.g., physical geography, civil engineering, and mathematics. The authors suggest a flow chart supporting stable evaluation of grain roundness with the Krumbein roundness chart, which is suitable for prompt semi-quantitative measurement of roundness and has been commonly used. Additionally, the authors redefine surface texture, a smaller-scale shape feature, because the boundary between roundness and surface texture is ambiguous in current studies with high-resolution image analysis. The methodological transition from analogue to digital measurement, i.e., image analysis, is in progress, and two- or three-dimensional quantitative image analysis is the preferred measurement approach. It is necessary to discuss further appropriate evaluation of grain shape corresponding to image analysis.

In the last few years, small unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and structure-from-motion multi-view stereo (SfM-MVS) photogrammetry have attracted a tremendous amount of interest for the creation of high-definition topographic data. This study detected spatial distributions of shallow landslides and their sediment yields using small UAVs and SfM-MVS photogrammetry. The study areas were the Saishigahana area (0.06km²) and the Sensuikyo area (1.00km²) at Aso Volcano, Japan, where many shallow landslides occurred due to heavy rainfall in July 2012.

We obtained ortho-rectified photographs with spatial resolutions of 0.04, and digital surface models (DSMs) with spatial resolutions of 0.10 and 0.16m. In the Saishigahana area, 26 landslides (19.87–4,593.85m²) occurred. The ratio of the total landslide area was 30% of the area. The estimated sediment yield reached 4.84 (±0.37)×10⁵m³/km². In the Sensuikyo area, 378 landslides (8.74–6,162.23m²) occurred. The estimated total landslide volume was 1.22 (±0.21)×10⁵m³/km². These sediment yields were 10 times greater than reported after the past rainfall-induced landslide events in the area. Our results demonstrated the potential sediment yields due to a single rainfall event at Aso Volcano.