A study of factorial ecology is one of the most useful techniques for the analysis of urban residential structures. Studies of the residential structure of Japanese cities using this technique have recently become popular. However, these studies do not deal with historical change in the ecological structures of the various factors.
With this problem in mind, the following study was conducted: As it has been the largest city in Japan, Tokyo was selected as the most appropriate study area. The Taisho era was selected as the first step for historical analysis. During this period, the urban structures of the Castle-Town, which had been built during the Edo era, coexisted with modern structures built during and after the Meiji era.
It has been said that the urban structure of Tokyo is generally divided into two areas: The white-collar residential districts (Yamanote) of the uplands, and the blue-collar residential districts (Shitamachi) of the fluvial lowlands. The areal pattern of the boundary has not, however, been investigated in detail until now. The purpose of this paper is to explain the urban residential structures of Tokyo during the Taisho era.
In the first stage of the analysis, a set of variables describing the social and economic characteristics of residential groups in various districts of the city was selected from some population characteristics taken from the 1920 Population Census of Japan. A total of 19 variables and 816 districts were used to determine the socioeconomic factors shown in Table 1. The principal factor method was then applied to the 816 x 19 original data matrix, and factor loadings, factor scores, and eigenvalues were obtained. These factors were rotated by the normal varimax method in order to obtain a simple structure. Next, factor loadings were interpreted and factor scores were mapped.
The factor analysis produced six factors which together accounted for 74 percent of the total variance of the data (Table 2). The first factor, accounting for 26.5 percent of the variance, separates the households of middle-aged craftsmen with children from wholesale and retail workers' household. Districts which were characterized by the households of middle-aged craftsmen with children extend to the eastern parts of Tokyo. For example, many districts in the Asakusa, Honjo, and Fukagawa Wards, and the western small valley tracts are included here (Fig. 2-a). High negative factor scores showing large wholesale and retail workers' household coincide with commercial districts (especially: wholesale store districts) in the Nihonbashi and Kyobashi Wards along the Tokaido and Oshukaido thoroughfare (Fig. 2-b). Negative factor scores are also seen in the western upper residential quarters. The second factor is interpreted as indicating workers in civil service and indepedent business enterprises. The districts having factor scores greater than 0.5 lay in Kojimachi, western Kanda, and the area from Akasaka to Hongo Wards, where sector patterns coincided with the Yamanote upland (Fig. 3). The third factor is interpreted as the “old widow factor”. High positively scored districts were distributed in the western residential areas and central entertainment districts (Fig. 4). On the other hand, high negative scoring districts were composed of four types of quasi-households. These are central wholesale and retail districts, eastern manufacturing areas, students' quarters and army quarters. The fourth factor is interpreted as blue-collar, the fifth factor as female workers and the sixth factor as unmarried persons. In cluster analysis the similarity between districts was measured by Euclid distance, and the hierarchical groupings were selected by the centroid method.

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In Japan onion production ranks fourth among the cultivated vegetable areas, and onions rank sixth in per capita consumption of vegetables as measured in kilograms. The onion occupies the first place among vegetables which are transported from the rural districts to the urban consumers. The author has been studying the geography of truck farming, above all its locational approach, so he began to investigate the onion producing regions in Hokkaido.
As the onion likes a cool season, it is usually grown during the winter and spring seasons on Japanese farms. Hokkaido farmers, however, cultivate the onion during the cool summer and harvest in the autumn. There are two main producing areas in Hokkaido: one is Ishikari Plain and the other is the Kitami district. Kitami especially has developed recently in a remarkable way so that Hokkaido as a whole has the highest onion yield in Japan.
In the Kitami district the temperature and the length of day which have an important bearing on onion bulb formation are highly favorable. The alluvial floodplain in Kitami Basin furnishes a fertile soil of sandy loam ideal for onion cultivation. An important social factor which has contributed to the increased production of onions in the Kitami district is that Kitami City has an abundant labor supply (especially women) cheaper than in the rival Ishikari Plain. In spite of these fundamental conditions, the development of onion cultivation in Kitami was delayed by insect damage and a poor marketing route. Yearly damage from the onion maggot hindered production after World War II until the life ecology of the worm was discovered and methods of extermination were determined in the 1960's. The Kitami district is a long way from the urban consumer market. Moreover, there was for a long time no marketing organization. When in 1965 the agricultural cooperatives began to manage onion sales, the Kitami farmers finally found an eager market for their crop.
Two reasons have stimulated onion cultivation. First a change in eating habits in the 1960's caused a demand for onions and raised the price. Second when in 1970 rice production was restricted by the government, the Kitami farmers chose to plant onions as a substitute crop.
As the onions stored until the supply is scarce are generally sold at a higher price than the freshly harvested crop, the agricultural cooperatives in the Kitami district have constructed many large onion storehouses since 1972. Kitami farmers who got good profits from onion production increased their onion fields in the following years.
It is the usual practice in Japan that onions are transplanted to the field after seedling culture. Though the farmers in Hokkaido use machines to transplant the onions, much hand labor is required. As machine and labor costs are higher in Hokkaido than in other parts of Japan the producers try to increase gross income by increased acreage. The average onion fleld in Hokkaido is 2.7ha in area, while in the rest of Japan the average area is only 0.5ha. The farmer engaged in small scale production outside of Hokkaido makes a small investment and utilizes family labor and thus he makes his profits. In Hokkaido, including Kitami, the higher price of autumn harvested onions overcomes the higher costs of machinery and labor.
In conclusion it seems that the new expansion of the Kitami onion fields is an example of intensive agriculture in a remote region caused increased demand.

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