Recovery from Disaster through Design Science Misato Uehara Shinshu University・Tadayoshi Inoue・Yoshifumi Tokita・Ryuzo Eda
GOOD DESIGN AWARDS 2021 (Category ; District and regional development)
It is heartbreaking to see people, who, having unexpectedly lost their homes in 2011 and still wanting to rebuild their lives on the seaside in Tohoku (their hometown), living through their own long disaster as they eke out a living in temporary housing
for as long as 10 years. In fact, after these long 10 years nearly 40% of the raised land in the three affected prefectures, created with maintenance costs and a variety of financial adjustments, now remains vacant. Design science, which was put into
practiced in this project, is an artistic process of thought that instantaneously integrates and comprehends discrete fields and domains to create a new future through holistic, non-fragmented human perception; it sits in stark contrast to the existing
academic framework that continues to subdivide and specialize. Ian McHarg’s Design with Nature is exactly the kind of design science that can be applied to urban planning. It is characterized by “doing more with less.”
In this project, we conducted the largest number of consultations with residents in the affected areas to relocate housing for victims of the earthquake in Shinchi Town, Fukushima Prefecture. In addition, we digitized and utilized historical book materials
from 1980 that were created to apply Ian McHarg’s Design with Nature philosophy to land planning in Japan. As a result, housing relocation was achieved in the short period of four years, while taking into account the overlap of complex disaster risks thatcannot be represented with a disaster hazard maps based on the latest individual calculations, as well as the wishes of each community for the site of the housing relocation. The construction period was short due to the elimination of large-scale
reclamation work to mitigate disaster risks. As a result, four of the seven sites have views of the sea, and the houses were rebuilt in a spacious environment that integrates with the existing nature of the surrounding forest and farmland. This bottom-up,point-by-point approach to relocation was one of the few cases in which a recovery in population was achieved in the disaster-stricken municipalities.

1.The Significance of Using Design Science and National Land Agency Data for Reconstruction

The National Land Agency (Regional Planning Team), which was established with aview to implementing Japan's first multi-disciplinary watershed planning, prepared the "Appropriate Land Use Evaluation Methods by Ecological Planning Study (1980)" to apply
the concept of Design with Nature to Japan's Third Comprehensive National Land
Development Plan before its home country, the United States.
It involves the process of integrating disaster risks, which are calculated using complex
preconditions and specialized parameters subdivided into different areas of expertise,with environmental factors (vegetation, geology, topography, slope classification) sothat these risks and factors can be intuitively understood and utilized by residents andgovernment officials.
These historical data unique to Japan, which was the first instance in the world ofapplying McHarg's theory to national land planning, was very innovative, but due to thedepreciation of the yen and appreciation of the dollar caused by the Nixon Shock, it
could not be fully reflected in actual planning and was forgotten. This project digitizedthat data and put them to actual use in the recovery from the Great East Japan
Earthquake in 2011.

Subject area: Shinichi Town,
Fukushima PrefectureHigh

Somewhat low

Low

High

Earthquake risk by geological map classification

Somewhat low

Low

Landslide risk by slope classification

High

Somewhat low

HighLow

Liquefaction risk byvegetation/ land use classification

Somewhat low

Low

Flooding risk by topographicalclassification

Integrated map (overlay)

2.The Bottom-up Design Process with Design Science2011

2012

2015

Candidaterelocation site

East Sakuda district×Relocation
cancelledEast Sakuda
West Sakuda
West Sakuda district
OkaGangoya

OtohamaOka district

××

TakakuraWest
Gangoya×
Gangoya district

West Gangoya
district

Multiple, overlapping risks

The town of Shinchi was able to achieve a bottom-up, point-by-point relocation of housing
by selecting seven sites from multiple candidate sites in each disaster-stricken community
through a combination of risk assessment of multiple disasters based on the theory of design
science and consultation with residents. Surprisingly, the National Land Agency's maps created
for the 1980 National Land Plan and the relative rankings of disaster risks for eachenvironmental category (top right) are able to show liquefaction and seismic risks that are notshown in the most comprehensive and up-to-date risk maps in Japan published by the Ministryof Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism (bottom right). It also shows the overall risk of
the region in relative terms.
On the other hand, the landslide risk in the latest disaster maps is assessed within a limited
environment (Ex. slopes above 30 degrees), so there is a large area that is not assessed within
the region. This part of the city appears to be a safe place for citizens and the government.

6 houses(0.7ha) inWest
GangoyaLow risk

Prepared by the National Land Agency (1980) Map Data Digitization and Risk
Assessment Integrated disaster risk maps for 1. earthquake, 2. landslide,liquefaction, and flood
Takakura district

Landslide risk
36 houses (4ha) in
Gangoya district

Tsunami risk

It took two years
to select seven sites
for relocation, thatinvolved a multidisaster risk
assessment andconsultation withlocal residents toquickly secure sites.

88 houses (5.6ha) in
Gangoya district

Flood risk

32 houses (2.8ha) in
Otohama district

Otohama district

West
SakudaEast
SakudaAs there was no need for large-scale reconstruction work to reduce the risk of disaster, the construction period was
short, and as a result, four out of the seven sites have a view of the sea, and the houses were reconstructed in arelaxed atmosphere that is contiguous with the existing nature of the surrounding forest and farmland.
In 2015, four years after the earthquake, the occupancy rate of the completed reconstruction housing reached 100%,and this bottom-up, point-by-point relocation has led to a population recovery that is rare in disaster-stricken
municipalities. Since the development was completed before the increase in the consumption tax rate and the demandfor construction work in other disaster-stricken areas as well as the Tokyo Olympics, the public works project was morecost-effective than other projects that suffered delays and high costs.

OkaGangoya

22 houses(2ha) in East
Sakuda33 houses (1.85ha)
in Oka district

Latest disaster hazard maps available on the Disaster Portal: Only landslides
on mountain sides and tsunami/flood risks in low-lying areas are shown.

Shinchi Town:
Bottom-up, pointby-point relocation
using Design Science

7 houses(0.6ha) in
Takakura

Otohama

The area that was inundated by the tsunami in
Shinchi Town was turned into a green space fordisaster prevention and a place of relaxation forthe community.

TakakuraWest Gangoya

2011

2015

General disasterareas in Tohoku:
Top-down relocation
through area-based
land readjustment(raising andrelocation to higherground)In general reconstruction, relocation sites were sought in larger units
that could be grouped together in one place for development thatconsolidated the affected residents, as in the case of the land readjustment
project implemented after the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake. As a result,
this method had to include areas with disaster risks such as tsunami flood
areas, rice paddies, wetlands, and embankments due to slope development.

2021
Transforming large areas of land that are not suitable for housing, such as tsunami flood zones, will require large-scale land
reclamation, terrace building for relocation to higher ground, and negotiations and acquisition of land from more landowners.
While this may seem more reasonable than a scattered, point-by-point plan like the one in Shinchi, ultimately it has proven to
be a more costly and time-consuming task to create the land for housing.

There are many vacant lots inresidential areas that have beenraised over the past 10 years.

3. Design science achieves a design recovery with diversity and sustainability in less time, while taking more factors into account.
In Fukushima Prefecture, which was hit by a massive earthquake of more than magnitude 9, a massive tsunami, and radioactive contamination from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant (including reputational damage), we were able to develop housing resistant to a myriad of disaster risks and had spatial diversity in a shorter
period of time. While most of the affected municipalities experienced a decline in population, Shinchi Town was able to recover its population by 2015, four years after the disaster. It is also of great significance that this project was made possible through collaboration with participants of different ages and positions (researchers,practitioners, administrators) who have an understanding of McHarg’s design science theory. In addition, since the archives digitized and utilized in this project are data for national land planning, they can be applied and deployed to a wide range of local governments. In this sense, the experience of this project will be useful for disasterprevention and recovery from natural disasters, which have become more severe and widespread in recent years.

West Sakuda district
M Residence in Gangoya district

Park with a view of the sea in West Sakuda

East Sakuda district
Shinchi town relocated the houses to an areathat is flood and earthquake resistant, so thetsunami stricken area became a disasterprevention green space. It is located on the eastside of the station and has playgroundequipment and a bike path.

Floor plan for #4 building in Otohama district
Oka district
Interior of M residence
Otohama district

Gangoya district

It was a difficult task to find and negotiate multiple housing sites foreach affected community, but we were able to rebuild a diverse town
contiguous with the existing natural surroundings. The basic unit ofreconstruction housing is up to 100 tsubo (330sqm), but many of thevictims were living in housing lots of more than 200 tsubo (660sqm)
before the earthquake. In comparison to raising the land and relocating
to higher ground, the Shinchi method allows for a more generous
allocation of land, and by setting up a system that allows people topurchase land at their own expense if the area exceeds the upper limit,
a generous average of 120 tsubo (396sqm) of reconstruction housing
was made possible. In the Gangoya district, fishermen who went out
early in the morning voluntarily live in together edge of this district.

Interior of M
residence
Floor plan for residence inGangoya district

Each district has a park where families and community members can gather,walking paths that provide easy access to each house and prevent theshadows of the houses from falling on the adjacent farmland, and a parking lot
for visitors that utilizes the leftover land from the development.
Little by Little