In most of Japanese large cities, the increase of automobile traffic has always caused traffic congestion of downtown areas. Simultaneously, the environmental problem due to automotive exhaust gas and the increase in traffic accident are also being generated. Therefore, measures that restrain a travel demand of automobiles have been examined in order to reduce them. It is to control automobile approaching to downtown areas. Moreover, an introduction of the transit mall for a purpose of making the space for the pedestrian has been considered and discussed as well.
However, such new measures are unacceptable for passengers easily, because they are drastic changes of the transportation system in downtown areas. Therefore, it becomes indispensable that the understandings of citizen and community are obtained, when it intends to carry out the measure by which traveler's behavior is changed in a downtown area. That is, it is important to introduce the idea of public involvement to the transportation scheme. At the same time, we should discuss the appropriate method to grasp needs of citizen for new measures.
The purpose of this study is to propose the approach for clarifying the transportation measure that citizen required. Namely, the method is considered to evaluate several alternative plans consisted of the multiple transportation measures. Concretely, we intend to introduce Conjoint Analysis in order to find the contributive factors and to decide the preferential alternative plan.
The practical study was introduced to three districts with the different attributes and two different groups in the case of new transportation planning in Sapporo city. The measures are consisted of six attributes of the transportation planning.
The results are as follows:
1) The residents in every district evaluated the high utility exists in the measure of extension of pedestrian space and the measure of underground space improvement, but have opposition to the measure of regulation of automobile crossing.
2) On the other hand, in the case of extension of tramcar line and cyclic exclusive area improvement, each district had a different opinion. They have more complex opinions towards regulation of automobile use in the supposed transit mall.
3) In view of the characteristics of districts, the differences between the district with better public transportation and the district without it is remarkable.
4) Due to the influence of information the residents' opinions become distinct. That is, the higher recognition of the public information and papers is, the more an opinion is clarified. This means the discussion of the measure introduced is more effective than before.

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The progress of motorization has realized urban transport system which depends heavily on automobile use. The excessive inclination to the automobile demand has caused the various social problems that originate the external diseconomies from automobile use. To sustainable urban transport system under the recent circumstance which has been limited by social restrictions as time passes, new public transport systems have been introduced to transfer automobile traffic demand. The social cost caused by travel using public transport is lower than using automobile. The purposes of introducing those new public transits are decreasing total social cost of urban transport system. However, most public transport agencies such as bus and transit companies go wrong in urban area. The public transport agency couldn't bear the huge investment cost to match automobile with respect to urban transport services. Much more the investment cost to reduce social external cost arising from automobile use cannot be born by public transit agency single-handedly. Furthermore, it would not be reasonable in the point of efficiency.
Miyagi et al. (1992) and Miyagi and Suzuki (1996) examine the cost allocation of new transit system between urban transport users to improve efficiency of urban transport system as the second best pricing problems for urban railway system competitive with automobiles.
In this study we apply second best pricing model restricted by multi modal network equilibrium to real scale urban transport network system and examine the burdening introducing cost of guide way bus system aiming at reduction of discharge gases arising urban transport system with automobile users. The results of applying to urban transport system in Gif u city leads to the following conclusions. The effects of introducing guide-way bus system are limited in this city because its urban transport system is inclined automobile extremely. On the other hand imposing fare on automobile use is available. Therefore imposing on automobile use and introducing guide way bus system should be enforced simultaneously. Furthermore if the public transport agency which operates guide way bus system were subsidized from the source of revenue collecting automobile fare, substitutable transport mode could be prepared for automobile users economically. As a result this related combination policy is the most effective way to transfer urban transport users from automobile to public transport.

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The integrated environmental and economic accounting is a satellite account of SNA which represents interrelations between the economy and the environment. On the hand, the environmental expenditure account and the waste account are satellite accounts of the integrated environmental and economic accounting, these represents a more detailed relation between specific environmental issues and the economy. In this paper, I tried to estimate the waste account in Hokkaido prefecture that focused on waste/recycling under the concepts of the SEEA.
As a result of this trial estimation, external diseconomies as the imputed environmental costs caused by waste treatment are 70, 214 million yen in Hokkaido prefecture in 1995. The breakdown of external diseconomies are 133 million yen for air pollution, 4. 950million yen for global warming, and 65, 131 million yen for the final disposal of waste. And the consumption of industry-related waste treatment services was 53, 222 million yen, the consumption of government-related waste treatment services was 46, 695 million yen, and total amount of output of recyclable goods was 1, 434 million yen in Hokkaido prefecture in 1995. In the other words, the waste treatment costs actually spent are 99, 917 million yen (=consumption of waste treatment services), but the additional waste treatment costs expected to be spent are 70, 214 million yen (=the imputed environmental costs).
In Japan, the waste treatment costs actually spent were 394.7 billion yen, and the additional waste treatment costs expected to be spent are 100.8 billion yen in 1995. The share in former of Hokkaido prefecture is 3.2%, and the share in latter is 7%. So it is necessary to decrease wastes and GHGs in Hokkaido prefecture.

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This paper attempts to empirically analyze the interregional repercussion of collecting environmental tax to introduce abatement technology for the case of China's air pollution problem, by applying a dynamic interregional CGE model. For this purpose, the possible future of energy technology development is forecasted by a series of scenarios. Then the short-term low scenario is simulated by assuming all sulfur tax will be paid back to local region to introduce desulfurization technology. Given several desulfurization technologies used in current secondary energy sector, each technology's affordability, environmental impacts and economic effects are numerically examined over 20 years. Finally, these technologies are assessed for China's sustainable development.

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There exist many studies on international trade theories incorporating environmental issues. Copeland and Taylor [2] (1999) used a two-country and two-sector model and investigated the pattern of trade and the gains from trade. They assumed that pollution generated from a manufacturing sector deteriorates the environment and lowers the productivity of an agricultural sector. They analyzed the case where the pollution is within a country. Unteroberdoerster [4] (2001), Benarroch and Thille [1] (2001) and Suga [3] (2002) extended the model to the case of transboundary pollution.
In this paper, in a similar model to theirs, we consider the global environment which is affected by the pollution generated from the production activity of a manufacturing good in each country. Then, under the assumption that the productivity of an environmentally sensitive good (agricultural good) is influenced by the global environment differently between countries, we derive the following results. If the generating degree of pollution is low in a country where the agricultural production is more sensitive to the environment, both countries may lose from trade. On the other hand, if the generating degree of pollution is high in that country, there is a possibility that both countries gain from trade.

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The economic growth of China in recent years brings a big change to its supply and demand structure of the food. China is remarkable as the source of supply of the food to the foreign countries in addition to the huge food consumer market, too.
It is expected that China's accession to the WTO has a big influence on the Chinese agriculture about which the international competitiveness is weak. But it is also expected that it brings a big change to the whole food system.
Moreover, it will have a big influence on the agriculture and the food industry in the Asian countries which are deepening a mutual-dependence relation, too.
Therefore, in this study, first, we will make the influence clear which China's accession to the WTO gives the food system in China after analyzing the present situation of the food system in China.
Next, we will analyze the mutual-dependence relation of the food industry and the Asian countries in China using the international input-output table.
Then, we will analyze about the influence which China's accession to the WTO gives the food system in the Asian area and propose a policy to build cooperative relation in the Asian area.

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The purpose of this study is to suggest the situation of parking lots that increases customers' probability to visit unscheduled destinations. In this study, customers are assumed to be personal car users. A questionnaire survey was carried out to investigate the characteristics of customers' shop-around behavior in the center of Sapporo, for example, the customers' predetermined destinations, the threshold walking distance between a predetermined destination and a parking lot used, and so on. A model using random utility function is developed to estimate customers' probability to visit any unscheduled destinations. According to the model, it is clarified that customers tend to visit unscheduled destinations as the distance between a predetermined destination and a parking lot becomes longer. Also, the threshold walking distance is estimated by using the random utility function. This model gives a result that the customers tend to use a parking lot situated near predetermined destination. Considering the results given by both models, it is clarified that when the distance between a parking lot and a predetermined destination is about 430 meters, customers' probability to visit unscheduled destinations is efficiently increased when no services with respect to parking fee is provided.

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This paper focuses on how to optimally conserve and use forestland subject to the limited land area, by assuming that total land area can be alternatively used ether for agricultural land or forestland. The optimal distribution between the two kinds of land use is analyzed by optimal control theory.
It is one of the major results of this paper that when the social benefit explicitly accepted is only stemmed from the outputs of both agriculture and forestry sectors, there is no optimal control plan towards the steady state. However, as far as the benefit from forestland stock like an environmental benefit is added to the social welfare function, then the optimal control plans towards the steady state can be feasible. Moreover it is also proved that when the social planner underestimates the intrinsic environmental value of forestland, the forestland area tends to be smaller in the steady state.
In the view of land policy, it is very natural to mention to the tax procedure levied on the profit from timbering in order to avoid the de-forestation. In the case where the tax is levied on the agricultural land stock, or the subsidy is paid for the forestland stock, the optimal control plans can be attained. It is also proved that the more is the land tax on agricultural sector or the subsidy for forestry sector, the more is the forestland area in the steady state.

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The purpose of this paper is to examine how much the regional distribution of human capital affects the interregional wage differentials in Japan. To measure the impact of them, the Gini coefficient was simulated in case where there was no difference in the distribution of human capital between prefectures and compared with the actual value. The result shows that more than half of the actual Gini coefficients can be explained by the regional distribution of human capital.

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We take up two provinces, Guangdong Province (an expanding coastal province with biggest inflow of population), and Sichuan Province (a retarded inland region with biggest outflow of population) in China, and construct an econometric model with 3-dimensional decomposition: 2 provinces (Guangdong and Sichuan Province), 2 areas (urban and rural) and 2 sectors (formal and informal). We paid special efforts to estimate the employment and productivity of formal and informal sectors in urban and rural areas. We divided the inter-provincial and intra-provincial migration into urban-rural flows accordingly. We also divided the total labor force in urban and rural areas into different skill groups based on academic careers (without education, graduates from elementary, junior high, senior high, university) to explain the different productivity (and thus level of employment) in each area and sector.
In traditional analysis of rural-urban labor movement a la Harris & Todaro, population movement from rural area to urban area occurs based on the comparison between the wage of urban formal sector discounted by unemployment rate and with average productivity in rural area. But in the actual world, poor people in urban area cannot stay as unemployed without any revenue, and they are pooled in informal sector with low productivity. Out model explicitly considers this point.
Our model has 51 equations (7 population movement, Guangdong Province with 21 equations, Sichuan Province with 21 equations, evaluation with 2 equations). We divide the population migration flows between 3 regions (Guangudong Province, Sichuan Province and other provinces), and between urban and rural areas. Then we decide urban and rural areas population based on natural increase and social increase. Next we explain employment and productivity of formal and informal sector in urban and rural areas, and decide GDP of each sector in urban and rural areas. Finally we decide the sum of GDP of 2 Provinces and differential of per-capita GDP between 2 Provinces for overall evaluation purposes.
We used the data of 1978-2000 (1990 price), and estimated equations by Least-Square-Method. The final test showed a good fitting in which MAPE are in principle under 5% (except 2 population migration variables with very small absolute levels). We applied this model to various simulation studies to assess the economic effects of relaxing restrictions on population migration, influence of changing educational distribution, promotion of foreign trade and development strategy of western inland regions.
Construction of this paper is as follow: Section 2 explains the changing trend of Chinese Economy; Section 3 explains model building; Section 4 shows simulation analysis; Section 5 shows economic projection until 2005; Section 6 concludes.
This is a part of our continuous research effort of econometric analysis of Chinese 30 provinces. Last year we reported an econometric model of two provinces based on aggregate variables. This year we improved the results by disaggregating employment and productivity into different areas and sectors, and also migration flows accordingly.

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Public libraries play an important role in guaranteeing the right ot know, but recently the fiscal deficits of the local governments make it difficult without operating more efficiently. Public libraries generally have several purposes, for example the provision of the access to infomation, promoting reading books among children, and so on. Therefore we observe several outputs of public libraries corresponding to these purposes, for example total circulation service for adults and those for children. In the present paper, we analyze the efficiency of public libraries in the wards of the ordinance designated cities using Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) because this method can deal with multiple inputs and multiple outputs. The empirical results point out the following two findings. One is that libraries in Osaka and Kobe are operating more efficiently than other cities. Another is that most of libraries are suggested an enhancement of circulation service for children in improvements. In addition to the DEA analysis, we also examine the demand side factor to affect the efficiency of public library, using the Tobit and the ordered probit models. The results show that corresponding to the children's demand for cirulation service properly is a key to improve the efficiency in administering libraries.

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The purpose of our paper is to analyze a design of efficient disposal system of industrial waste and a tax on industrial waste leading to optimal solutions. We also consider the using of its tax revenue.
The economic model in our paper is composed of firms discharging waste, disposers of waste, final disposers of waste and a local government. Firms discharging waste must recycle a part of waste and dispose a remaining waste. They hand the remaining waste to disposers of waste and are charged the tax on waste by a local government. A local government chooses whether he pays its tax for a reinforcement of monitoring for illegal dumping or a subsidy for disposers of waste to dispose. If the using of its tax revenue is a reinforcement of monitoring for illegal dumping, illegal dumping by disposers of waste decreases. But it causes that recycling rates are larger than optimal recycling rates. If the using of the tax is a subsidy for disposers of waste to dispose, it leads to decreases of illegal dumping by them and achieves socially optimal solutions.

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Recently, improvement of port is not only “physical distribution function”, and “water amenity function” seems to be also necessary. From such background, improvement of various water amenity functions is desired in OTARU, ISHIKARI BAY NEW, IWANAI port which is main port in Hokkaido Shiribeshi region. It is necessary to grasp request of user in order to improve such water amenity function.
Then, consciousness investigation for OTARU port, ISHIKARI BAY NEW port, and IWANAI port was carried out in order to grasp function which Sapporo citizen requires in port. And, AHP which was one of the consciousness investigation analysis procedures was noticed in this investigation. Then, questionnaire which utilized this technique was carried out. By stratification two stage random sampling, 900 households in Sapporo city were extracted, and recovery number was 194. This study reduced evaluation burden to examinee using concise AHP which combined “Relative Position Measurement Approach” with “Semantics Measurement Approach”.
From analysis result, next was proven.
(1) Needs of rest-view function and commerce function are high.
(2) By age attribution, weight of requiring function is different.
(3) Total evaluation result of OTARU port is high. It is a reason that evaluation of restprospect and commerce function is high.
And, characteristics of AHP were utilized, it was proposed that port improvement effect analysis method which considered Public Involvement.

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The aim of the current study is to apply hedonic price model to estimate the price of the aging housing stock in the central part of Ankara City. The main focus of the research is to investigate the effect of the location of the housing unit relative to the social services on the price of the units. In order to achieve this goal, two important indicators will be used; the first one is the proximity of the housing unit to the social services and the second one is the mass of the social service areas which represents the level of impact intensity. GIS mapping facilities and Network Analysis will be used throughout the research as a powerful tool to handle the spatial data sets and to calculate the proximity measures from the social service areas.

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Recently, Batabyal (2000) has demonstrated that when the land development question is studied in an intertemporal and random setting, it is possible that a landowner will never develop (always preserve) his or her land. This result arises because the landowner in Batabyal (2000) maximizes the likelihood of accepting the best possible bid of development. What happens when a landowner employs the following decision rule: Develop land as long as the dollar value of a bid exceeds a stochastic reservation level of revenue? In this paper, we provide an interesting answer to this question. First, we establish that the likelihood of developing land with this decision rule is always positive. Even so, we point out that on average, a landowner who uses this decision rule will always end up preserving his or her land.

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In recent years there has been considerable research attention directed at understanding the economic performance of sovereign very small states, many of which are also islands. This paper reviews the theoretical and conceptual arguments concerning the different challenges which small states and island economies face within an increasingly globalised system. The empirical evidence drawn from previous research by the authors stands in direct contrast to the theoretical literature. Very small states are shown to have performed generally very well and their economic performance is as good as, and often better, than that of larger states. Interestingly, whether a very small state is an island or not appears to have virtually no influence upon subsequent economic performance. The paper concludes with a comparison of very small states and non-sovereign island economies within Western Europe. Sovereign small states (whether islands or not) generally perform better than their non-sovereign island counterparts in Western Europe. The pattern is not, however, a uniform one. Some non-sovereign islands in Western Europe, particularly those able to develop summer vacation tourism activity have performed well.

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Professor Fujioka analyzed the optimization behavior of consumers in a Deposit-Refund System in his paper which he published in Studies in Regional Science, vol. 29 No.3, 1998. Professor Oishi criticized Professor Fujioka's two stage maximization analysis as the strange case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde in his paper which he published in Studies in Regional Science, vol. 32 No.1, 2002. Alternatively, he proposed a well-refined model of a unified Deposit-Refund Theory.
In this paper, first we provide a new model for the Deposit-Refund System Analysis. Second we conclude the new model is a specified one of the Oishi model because the two stage maximization of a representative consumer in the new one is consistent with the one stage maximization of the Oishi model with strict assumptions. Thirdly we conclude the Fujioka's is also a specified kind of the Oishi model because the Fujioka model should be identified as the new one from my point of view. Finally, we note that the two stage maximization without strict assumptions in the new model may be closely related to the half-rationality, a new concept which Professor Sakai, the President of the Japan Section of Regional Science Association International, introduces into regional scientists.

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Car-sharing system has two forms that are as follows:
(i) Using one car by turns
(ii) Using one car at the same time
The former is suitable to improve the rate of operation of cars while the latter is effective to increase the rate of passengers who get on a car. Most of currently available car-sharing services belong to the type (i). This type is not fit to relief the traffic congestion in specific time (for example, at a peak period in morning). Type (ii) is more important to reduce the number of traffic volume at the same peak period. The type (ii) was adopted in this analysis. It was matter to know whom a passenger should share the car with to arrive at his/her destination by the usual time. To estimate the probability to share a car, time-space prism was applied in this analysis. When the arrival time and the destination of a passenger is included in first passengers prism, it means sharing the car by these passengers is possible.
This type of car-sharing makes it possible for more people to move by the same number of cars. To increase the efficiency of the traffic, the first passenger who should drive has to depart earlier than usual. We made it clear the relationship between the driver's loss of time and the change of the efficiency.

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In this paper, we analyze whether it can decrease the inefficiency of policy making by voting, which it was seen in Lizzeri and Persico (2001), by the central government and about the problem of allocation of political authority between the local and central government which can choose local public goods provision policy or redistribution policy of income. In Lizzeri and Persico (2001), the candidate who promises the provision of local public goods is not always chosen by voters even though the value of local public goods is high. This is inefficient in the view of social welfare.
However, in case this local public goods has spillover effect and the central government has the information about desirable public goods for this region sufficiently, it is desirable to give the political authority to the central government in the view of social welfare. As the value of public goods increase, the domain it is desirable to give the political authority to the central government expands in Winner-take all-system.
Conversely, in proportional-system, this domain is getting narrow with increasing of the value of one.

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This study discusses the cost allocation for the cooperative project on construction of regional information technology in terms of utility maximization method. It is assumed that the joint investment organization including municipal concerns promotes the regional optical fiver network systems in the area where it is disadvantageous for enterprise compared with the advanced area. The case study was executed in the Tokachi River Basin where the existing basic fiver networks are allocated. Here, the utility functions of the agents that participate in the project are formulated due to multiplier manner. In order to find the optimal cost of each agent, Genetic algorithm was adopted. The project can be operated appropriately due to evaluating the maximum utility of the comprehensive formulation in the cooperative system.

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In this study, I estimated implicit prices of amenities of great Japanese cities based on Roback (1982)'s model. She proposed general equilibrium model of wages and rents setting both behaviors of consumers and firms.
Comparing with some papers that analyzed implicit prices of amenities of Japanese cities based on her models, this study differs from those in following three points.
(1) This study estimated implicit prices of amenities in three terms and observed the changes of those.
(2) By (1), this study shows the changes of implicit prices of each kind of amenity indicators, and the changes of city rankings on integrated amenity valuation. Also it proposes policy implications to make amenities better for each cities.
(3) As for econometric analysis, I deflate the wages by regional difference index of consumer prices, and I make amenity indicators standardized.
As empirical study, I estimated implicit prices of 8 kinds of amenities and integrated amenity prices of 13 cities on 3 terms.
I can conclude as follows.
(1) As results, we have been appreciating the infrastructure constructions and accumulations of human capitals more.
(2) As for integrated amenity valuation, we have been appreciating Tokyo, Yokohama and Fukuoka more, but not Osaka and Kyoto.
(3) The results of regressions show that wage regression made worse performance than rent regression.
(4) Anyway, by this analysis I can propose policy implication that those are important for local government to improve infrastructure and educational environment.

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Exchange rate management has become a hot topic in academic circles examining the merits of fixed versus floating regimes. The 1997-98 Asian crisis has refocused attention on the exchange rate management of East Asian countries. Most views expressed are critical of the pre-crisis US dollar peg regime, citing it as one cause of the crisis.
This article evaluates the pre-crisis US dollar peg regime in the selected East Asian countries by examining its negative effect on trade balance through currency appreciation. The main findings of the study are as follows: First, a significantly large appreciation of real effective exchange rates was found in the selected East Asian countries under the pre-crisis US dollar peg regime. Second, a regression analysis verified the correlation between real effective exchange rates and trade balances. Third, a simulation analysis showed that the appreciation of real effective exchange rates had a clearly negative effect on trade balances. The strategic implication of our findings is how important the stabilizing of the real effective exchange rate is in exchange rate management.

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This paper investigates the intea-provincial vis-à-vis inter-provincial regional disparities in China. The data used include those on prefectures and other regions in Guangxi, southern China. Compared to its eastern neighbor Guangdong (Canton), Guangxi's economic growth is distinctively lower. Indeed it is one of the poorest areas in China.
The results of the principal component analysis suggest that economic conditions in regions that are defined jurisdictionally as ‘prefectures’ are clearly different from those areas more economically classified as ‘cities’. The estimated income distribution structures suggest increasing disparities among prefectures. In fact our empirical tests reject both the β convergence and σ convergence in all prefectures. This implies that regional disparity is expanding in Guangxi. By comparison, the convergence hypothesis is accepted when twelve central cities within each prefecture (as an administrative area) are examined. Thus, regional disparities among cities are diminishing.
The regional disparities in Guangxi are specific to its urban part or ‘cities’ and its rural part or ‘prefectures’. While the disparities among the cities are diminishing, their sizes are not large enough to be able to exploit agglomeration effects for further growth. Economic development in many prefectures in Guangxi is even less likely than in its urban areas because local governments often have incentives to allocate resources more to cities than rural areas. Probing deeper into optimal allocation of resources to urban and rural areas will be of particular interest and importance to future research along the lines of the present study.

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