"Considering the Waterfront Renovation of City Core of Tokyo Vol.1"

Date： 31, May. 2006 (Wed) 18:30-21:00
Place: Meeting Room B, Boissonade Tower 25F, Ichigaya Campus, Hosei University

"Ship Transportation within a City"
Takeo Koyama (Professor emeritus at Tokyo University, Ship Engineering)
　Fast ships utilization for the access to urban transportation has a lot of possibilities; e.g., proposals are made for the accesses from Kobe to Kansai International Airport, from Ochanomizu to Haneda International Airport, etc.
　Ship transportation is well functioned in the cities of overseas; e.g., San Rafael (San Pablo Bay) in San Francisco, from Boston Airport to downtown areas, from John F. Kennedy International Airport to Manhattan, from Battery Park to Staten Island (about 10km, opened in 1819), commuter of Themes River in London (Docklands) where ships navigate far upstream.
　One of the representative examples of inland water transportation of Europe is Venice; large buildings have entrance from both canals and streets; gondolas and water taxies provide direct access to the airport. The development of the canal through the Elbe and Danube rivers to the Black Sea is in progress. The Kiel Canal at the mouth of the Elbe connects to the Baltic Sea. The locks for ascending of ships are characteristic landscape in European cities; Neckar River (from Heidelberg to Burgenstra_e) has ship-lifts; in Holland, I saw a canal was running over expressway around the Schiphol Airport (8m below sea level) and a drawbridge blocks the road. On the other hand, road transportation measures such as tipper lorry have not been well developed.
　In Japan of the Edo period, water transportation was flourished; westward ship (Kitamaebune) linking Hokkaido to Osaka, Bensaisen in Tsuruga-Kyoto (commonly referred to as Sengokusen), regular ship transportation from Kawagoe to Edo, etc. The canal networks of Edo and Osaka served a role as present expressways.
　Today it seems to be rare to view a landscape from a ship; we can enjoy such experience in Yanagawa, Suigo, Matsushima, Tsukumo Island, Oki Island, Abutoseto, etc. I recommend to see the land as near as possible from a shore.
　Even in the present city where land transportation is fully developed, ship served major roles in physical distribution; e.g., 8 hundred million importation and 1 hundred million exportation. I think the publicity of marine industry (marine transportation and ship building industries in narrowly speaking) is important, because Japan could not be kept developed without international cooperation.

"Renovation of the Kanda River and the Nihonbashi River for Tourism-Oriented Nation"
Yuji Miura (Dean Emeritus of Nihon University, Director of Urban Environment Research Activities (authorized NPO), Head Director of Chiba Division of Coastal Environment Creation Institution (authorized NPO), Head Director of Kokusai Ginou Shinko Zaidan (KGS))
　It is of the utmost important to clean water to renovate the Kanda River and the Nihonbashi River. Because rainwater and domestic wastewater run through the rivers together, heavy rains push sewage into outer moats including the Ushigome Moat. Although the changeover from confluent style to diversion style will be expensive, I wish to start with the Kanda River and the Nihonbashi River. Meanwhile, we can start to utilize groundwater and surrounding roof waters to merge into moats and rivers.
　In the next place, as for the closeness to water, if an underground river (spring-fed pond) of Kannana Street will control the flood, the tide wall of the Kanda River can be lowered by building a lock at the contact point of the Kanda River and the Edo River where the Nihonbashi River flows into the Sumida River. The distance between ground level and the water level will be shortened and canoes, boats, pleasure ships will be in service in the Kanda River and the Nihonbashi River. For the hinterland of the quays, surface development will be needed to realize updated river banks. As foot paths of canals of England, board walks over rivers will be suited for us to achieve the closeness to water.
　At the time of an earthquake occurrence, water systems and hydrant stop. From the viewpoint of fire control, it is important to sail disaster prevention ships; the opinion to open the Kachidoki Bridge is partly based on the consideration of such element. Dotted rivers and narrow canals will also be important because they had boat slips for disaster prevention. For example, although the Tokiwa Bridge provides the boatslip to respond to the tide level of 2m, at the time of low or high water, it will be difficult to use it because of the relation with water level; in addition, the entrance is always locked. Nobody will be able to come and help when a disaster occurs.
　In the last place, I will refer to Nihonbashi. The removal of expressway has been recently discussed, for which I am both for and against. I think the expressway should not be immediately or partly removed; it should be examined from the multiple points of view including the change of traffic volume along with the development of metropolitan beltway, useful life of bridge piers of expressway, waterfront renovation, etc.