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ABSTRACT
Over the past 18 years, policies for Healthy Cities have been introduced in Japan to promote public health and provide ample green spaces through the collaborative efforts of various sections of Japan’s local governments. These efforts have been directed at such matters as the health of city residents, grounds maintenance, sport, and community development in both plan-making and implementation, and share the common goal of creating more green spaces. In this study, we reviewed policies for Green Structure Plans in coordination with Health Promotion Plans and policies for Healthy Cities in six Japanese cities, and assessed the role of policies for Healthy Cities in supporting and promoting green spaces and policies for planning green spaces in these cities. We found that the integrated planning of public health and the provision of sufficient green spaces, particularly in disadvantaged city areas, can produce significant improvements in the quality of the environment. We also determined the city size that is best suited to cross-sectional collaboration for policy development and implementation in the planning process.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Supplementary data
Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/23748834.2023.2188636.
Notes
1. The Alliance for Healthy Cities is a partnership led by WHO for governmental and non-governmental organizations to improve the health of the people in the region. https://www.who.int/westernpacific/about/partnerships/partners/alliance-for-healthy-cities-(afhc).
2. The green coverage rate is the ratio of the area covered with trees, grasses, and flowers to the total area and is used to measure the quantity of greenery based on a ground plan (Suita City, 2016).
3. Land re-adjustment projects are undertaken in areas in need in order to provide and improve infrastructure, e.g. roads, parks, and rivers to readjust city blocks and promote land uses for housing (the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, and Transport and Tourism undated-b).
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Notes on contributors
Tomoko Miyagawa
Tomoko Miyagawa is a professor of environmental planning and landscape in the Faculty of Systems Engineering, Wakayama University, Japan, researching environmental regeneration with an educational background of town and country planning and residential environment. Her research interests are utilizing and improving the quality of the environment for well-being and sustainability issues, particularly on unused or underused lands such as brownfields greening into green spaces. Her research has been focused on policies and plans for environmental regeneration including creation of green spaces with partnership working with long-term management.
Noriko Otsuka
Noriko Otsuka is a senior researcher in the Research Group Mobilities and Space at ILS Research gGmbH in Germany and an associate professor (specially appointed) at Osaka University, Japan, researching urban design and transport planning. She has a PhD in Urban Design from Oxford Brookes University in the UK. She is also an architect in Japan with work experience. Her research interests relate to sustainable urban mobility, walkability and urban design, trans-national transport planning and brownfield regeneration. Her research aims to improve quality of urban spaces by integrating urban design and transport planning.
Hirokazu Abe
Hirokazu Abe is an architect and a professor at Cyber Media Centre, Osaka University, Japan, researching urban design and urban regeneration. He is a representative of research division involved in architectural design, urban design and social design. His research interests are visualization of architectural and urban spaces, preservation of historical district and buildings in Asia, brownfield regeneration and redevelopment, and community design and social framework. His research aims to improve various spaces and areas socially and ecologically by designing architecture and platforms for community.