Silviase/jgov_v1.4_full_ann huggingface dataset:
Actual authorization results of construction plans for designated buildings etc. based on the "New Barrier-free Act"

Fiscal year	1994	1995	1996	1997	1998	1999	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008
Number of authorizations (fiscal year)	11	120	229	320	382	366	332	232	280	367	386	348	331	289	255
Number of authorizations (cumulative figure)	11	131	360	680	1,062	1,428	1,760	1,992	2,272	2,639	3,025	3,373	3,704	3,993	4,248

Source: Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism

Based on the New Barrier-free Act, in order to build roads connecting stations, government facilities and hospitals for everybody to use, especially for senior citizens and disabled persons, the construction of barrier-free walking spaces is being pushed forward, including the construction of wider pavements, the resolution of pavement bumps, inclination improvement, the construction of elevators for multi-dimensional road-crossing facilities, etc.

3) Construction of barrier-free urban parks, etc.

According to the obligations stipulated in the New Barrier-free Act and the subsidy system, the bump resolution of the entrance and roads in the parks as well as the construction of facilities such as toilets that are easily usable by senior citizens and disabled persons are being carried out. The development of urban parks is continuing for enabling senior citizens and disabled persons to use parks securely and safely. Furthermore, the enhancement of slopes and handrails is being pushed forward for building closed natural spaces, such as rivers and harbors, which everyone can enjoy.

Example case of flower bed installation in consideration for wheelchair users (Uminonakamichi Seaside Park)

2. Development of the parenting environment for a society with few children

(1) Support on the compatibility of work with child care

1) Support on securing housing suits for newly married couples and parenting families

At the same time as pushing forward the rental housing supply to families, support is being provided on acquiring quality home suits for newly married couples and parenting families through housing loans utilizing securitization business of Japan Housing Finance Agency. Additionally, for public rental housing, the combined construction of childcare facilities such as day nurseries is being pushed forward. In addition, measures are being taken in order for business operators to offer higher priority of home acquisition to parenting families. Furthermore, the development of conditions for quality housing supply and residential urban districts is being carried out for realizing urban life that is close to workplaces and is easy for childcare.
Transportation Act”, in order to secure the necessary transportation for local people’s living, a registration system is being implemented for enabling transportation responsible for welfare and transportation for under-populated areas when it is difficult for bus and taxi business operators to fulfill the needs and the regional related parties agreed the necessity of self-use transportation. As of the end of FY 2008, this has been implemented in 2,384 organizations.

### 4. Promotion of the Mobility Support

Coping with an aging population and low birth-rate society, it is essential to collect and provide precise route information for the aged and the disabled as well as to build a barrier-free environment by both hard and soft measures, which enables them to go out and walk lively.

Since 2009, the “Promotion of the Mobility Support” projects have been implemented. The projects include collecting and providing the Pedestrian Network Data, that is, barrier information such as bumps, road width and

slopes. Taking advantage of ubiquitous technologies, expansion and promotion of the Mobility Support services for people with mobility constraints is also underway.
## Section 2 – Measures against Natural Disasters

Because of its geophysical and climatological conditions, our country is subject to frequent natural disasters and suffers from damage of flooding and sediment disasters every year. Additionally, our country is located in an active region for earthquakes and volcanic eruptions and around 20% of the world's earthquakes (magnitude 6 or above) occur in and around Japan. Therefore, the protection of citizens' lives and properties from natural disasters is an important issue. Recently, accompanying the advance of urbanization and the aging problem, the importance of measures against natural disasters is increasingly high.

### 1. Building a strong and safe country against disasters

## (1) Flood control measures

In our country, ~50% of the population and ~75% of properties are concentrated in ~10% of flood regions and the potential risk of floods has been extremely high. The flood control security level has been steadily increasing so far through the development of river course expansion, embankment and discharge channels and the development of dams and flood control basins for temporarily storing floodwater. However, the target security level and facility development are still low when compared with foreign developed countries.

Furthermore, for the past 30 years, the frequency of heavy rains recording over 50 mm rainfall per hour is increasing. In 2009, heavy rainfall occurred in July in Chugoku and Kyushu and Typhoon Etau ( $ 9^{th} $ typhoon in 2009) brought over 100 mm rainfall per hour causing great damage in various regions. Therefore, together with the development of flood control facilities for preventing disasters, it is also important to work out damage reduction measures for minimizing damage and losses during disasters.

How the Land in the Metropolitan Area are Currently Used
3) Provision of disaster prevention information during flooding

## 2 ) Preparation of the hazard map

For enabling citizens to take the appropriate evacuating actions during disaster, the creation and distribution of hazard maps are being pushed forward for informing citizens of evacuation sites and evacuation routes in advance. Moreover, an Internet portal site $ ^{1} $ has been established for enabling the public to browse the national hazard maps.

According to the “Flood Fighting Act”, the preparation of flooding hazard maps is obligatory and guidance for drawing these maps is stated. Moreover, a “complete hazard map for the whole district” is being pushed forward for displaying floodwater depth during river flooding and indicators related to floods (e.g. evacuation place) on telegraph poles.

For inland flooding hazard maps, in view of their importance as non-structural measures for reducing flood damages, drawing guidance is stated and regional public organizations support map drawing at the early stages.

For tsunami and tidal wave hazard maps, as one of the large-scale disaster measures against the Tokai, Tonankai and Nankai earthquakes, the related ministries and government offices are cooperating to provide drawing manuals and case collection.

For sediment disaster hazard maps, based on the “Basic Guidelines for Sediment-related Disaster Prevention”, the preparation of hazard maps combined with the designated sediment disaster caution districts is being pushed forward.

For volcanic hazard maps, a list of 29 volcanoes, which greatly affect society due to volcanic activities, was released.

In order to provide information contributing to awareness of floods and smooth evacuation, rivers forecast to flood are specified among the major rivers and public announcements on flood forecasting (flood warning information, flood caution information, etc.) are performed. Furthermore, other major small and medium size rivers are specified as rivers for which water levels are announced for the purpose of delivering water-level information (Special Alert Water Level), which is the reference figure for issuing the official announcement of evacuation warnings.

Moreover, in order to provide information including water level, rainfall, flood forecasting and flood fighting alerts,

## Providing information for disaster prevention that is easy to understand

Providing information through digital terrestrial broadcasting

real-time river information is being provided for the public on the website named “River Disaster Prevention Information $ ^{2} $ ”. When a typhoon occurred at the end of September 2009, the hit rate of the website was about 40 million times per day and was being used effectively for alerts and evacuations during flooding.
Furthermore, measures against regional heavy rain and torrential downpours are being promoted, such as the development of the X band Multi-parameter Radar $ ^{1} $ network, the sophistication of flood forecasting and the provision of river information to related autonomies from the Flood Disaster Forecast Center which was established at the Regional Development Bureau in April 2009.

4) Issuance of sediment-related disaster warning information

If there is a risk of sediment disaster during heavy rains, prefectures and the Japan Meteorological Agency will announce sediment-related disaster warning information jointly and information will then be provided to municipalities through the prefectural Fire Defense and Disaster Prevention Division, in order to provide reference information for the mayor to decide the time to announce evacuation alerts and for local people to decide the evacuation method by themselves.

5) Sophistication of weather information for disaster prevention

From May of 2009, the Japan Meteorological Agency extended the forecast period of the typhoon track to five days and worked out the enhancement of supporting early disaster prevention preparing activities. Besides, in June

of the same year, the weather subcommittee of the traffic policy council summarized the “the appropriate method for weather service for reducing the damages caused by regional heavy rains”. According to this summary, the popularization and enlightenment of safety knowledge towards education institutes is carried out by using newly formed guidance on the utilization of weather information for disaster prevention. At the same time, monitoring ability was improved through developing the additional weather Doppler radar and shortening the observation interval of the weather radar.
## Column – Regarding warning and advisory issuance for municipalities

Due to the succession of huge typhoon and flooding damages caused by the seasonal rain front and typhoons occurring in FY 2004, according to the MLIT policy review, the Japan Meteorological Agency formulates the enhancement policy in providing the disaster prevention weather information including the adjustment from the warning issuance standard to the evacuation recommendation standard, the clarification of target districts for warnings etc. Measures are formulated based on the review results of evacuation recommendation made by the cooperation of related ministries and government offices, and the appropriate judgment standards for evacuation instructions and supporting people who need assistance during disasters.

In order to more effectively utilize heavy rain and flooding warnings and advisory issuances for taking disaster prevention actions during weather disasters, the Japan Meteorological Agency took specific measures and carried out the enhancement of announcement standards, such as introducing new indicators that can more appropriately represent the dangers of landslides and flooding disasters. Moreover, in order to closely support the evacuation recommendation performed by the mayor and the individual evacuation method decided by local people, the following improvements are implemented from the latter part of May 2010.

## (1) Delivering warnings and advisory issuances to municipalities individually

Warnings and advisory issuances for drawing attention against disasters caused by heavy rain and flooding have been delivered to numerous divided districts in the target prefectures so far. However, hazardous phenomena are likely to occur in limited areas and time. Therefore, warnings and advisory announcements are delivered to individual municipalities in order to state the districts in need of caution more clearly.

Additionally, warnings and advisory issuances of heavy rain, flooding and storm surges are carried out according to standards reflecting the circumstances of individual municipalities.

## (2) Clear statement of disasters to be cautious of with heavy rain warning

Although the “Heavy Rain Warning” has been drawing the attention of warnings against flooding and landslides, the disaster types to which attention should be paid is not easy to understand. Therefore, the issuance of heavy rain warnings is accompanied by disaster types to which special attention should be paid, such as “Heavy Rain Warning (landslide)” and “Heavy Rain Warning (flooding)”.

# Image of Detailed Warning/Advisory issuance for individual City/Town/Village (Example of Fukuoka Prefecture)

Present

Warnings and alerts are announced by dividing prefectures into administrative divisions, which include multiple municipalities.

In and after May, 2010

Warnings/alerts are announced based on the unit of city/town/village.

The municipalities that need to be alert are clearer.
## Effect of Introduction of Transport Safety Management Systems in Major Operators (October 2006 – September 2009)

(2) Collecting and utilizing information on Accident / Potentially Serious Error Data

### 2. Safety measures for railway transportation

The number of operation accidents in railway transportation is moving in a long-term decreasing trend $ ^{1} $ and has been moving to 800 since FY 2001 as a result of carrying out the promotion of railroad crossing accident prevention measures, and the development and enhancement of safety equipments such as the automatic train stop device (ATS).

## (1) Ensuring the safety of railway tracks

Due to the derailment accident of Fukuchiyama Line that happened in April 2005 and also with consideration for recent accidents, measures are being carried out for pushing forward the development of introducing an Automatic Train Stop device (ATS) with a speed restricting function on curvilinear parts that is obligated by the partial revision of the "Ministerial Ordinance Prescribing the Technical Standards Regarding Railways", the establishment of a train stopping device for when the driver is indisposed, and an operation situation recording device.

Note: 1. Injuries/deaths are mainly caused from crossing accidents, entering public railway tracks and falling from platforms.

2. 2 accidents have occurred where passengers have died (The train derailment accidents on the Fukuchiyama Line of JR West and on the Uetsu Main Line of JR East) since the train crash on the Eidan Hibiya Line in March 2000.

Source: The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport
5) Popularization and promotion of developing and enhancing the practicality of Advanced Safety Vehicles (ASV)

From FY 2006, the $ 4^{th} $ ASV Project has been carried out through the cooperation of industry, academics and government. A subsidy is being provided for a Damage Mitigation Braking System for heavy duty vehicles.

6) Enhancing and strengthening the recall system

Based on preventive measures against inappropriate behavior relating to recalls performed by automobile manufacturers, best efforts are being made toward the serious utilization of the recall system through strengthening information collection and monitoring systems as well as technical verification. In addition, MLIT is currently considering new measures to enhance the recall system by putting more emphasis on the viewpoint of automobile users. Also, to raise the awareness of automobile users about malfunctions and to prompt the proper use and maintenance of automobiles as well as the taking of appropriate actions for the occurrence of malfunctions, MLIT has started to publish information on accidents and fires caused by malfunctions that automobile manufacturers report to MLIT.

7) Sophistication of automobile inspections

In order to identify vehicle problems relating to illegal additional customization $ ^{1} $ and recall in the early stages, automobile inspections are becoming more sophisticated through the utilization of ICT-enhanced automobile inspection information.

(4) Protecting victims through the automobile damage compensation protection scheme

The automobile damage compensation protection scheme is a compensation scheme that is the responsibility of automobile owners and conducts self-responsible insurance, governmental indemnification and victim relief. It also plays an important role in protecting traffic accident victims.

## Section 5 – Risk Management and Safety Protection Measures

1. Promote measures against crime and terrorism

(1) Measure risk management and safety protection through cooperation with various countries

1) Achievements based upon the International Security Ministerial Conference

Regarding land transportation, in the “International Working Group on Land Transport Security (IWGLTS)” were established as a result of the “International Security Ministerial Conference” that was hosted by our country in 2006. As a result, information regarding land transportation security is being shared, and cooperation is being reinforced between various countries. In addition, G8, IMO, ICAO and APEC have joined the discussion on transportation security and measures are being conducted with regard to international cooperation and harmonization of security policy.
Since 2008, incidents of commercial ships being attacked by pirates with military equipment has been rapidly increasing. In FY 2009, the number of piracy incidents in the same waters doubled. In 2009, as a result of the current situation and in view of the content of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, Japan approved the “Law on Punishment of and Measures against Acts of Piracy” and has defined piracy as a crime in our country. Based on the new law, from July 2009, navigating ships are being escorted by a convoy of Japan Maritime Self-Defense Forces. MLIT is also contributing

internationally to foreign ships by acting unitarily as an escort to protect Japan-related ships in particular.

In addition, Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force ships are dispatched to Somalia by explicit orders based on this Act. In order to execute policing actions appropriately against piracy including arrest and criminal procedures, Japan Coast Guard is providing 8 Coast Guard Officers on the convoy. Japan Coast Guard is providing support to improve the ability of the coast guard organizations

## 2 ) Measures against piracy

Sites of Piracy Incidents etc. Involving Ships Related to Japan (2009)

Transition in the numbers of piracy incidents in the world

Note: The numbers for Malacca/Singapore Straits and oceans surrounding Somalia are included in those for South-east Asia and Africa respectively.

Note: The number for oceans surrounding Somalia from 2000 to 2008 represent the total numbers for Somalia and Gulf of Aden/the Red Sea. The numbers for oceans surrounding Somalia in 2009 include 6 piracy incidents that occurred in the Indian Ocean and Oman added to ones in Somalia. Gulf of Aden/the Red Sea, due to the new compilation arrangement for the annual report (2009) of IMB.

of corresponding coastal countries by inviting officials of the coast guard institutes of the coastal countries surrounding Somalia (e.g. Yemen) for maritime law enforcement training course through the JICA programs. With regard to measures against piracy in South-East Asia, assistance is being provided for human resource development, and expertise and experience sharing through cooperative training by patrol ship dispatches and implementation of training from 2000. As a result, the occurrence of piracy has been reduced in peak periods from 242 to 45 in 2009. Which is an 80% reduction.
## Column – Measures against Piracy in Aden Bay

In June 2009, the New Foundation Act was established. Presently, marine security actions are being carried out to escort and protect ships from piracy. With regard to piracy in Aden Bay, MLIT is intensifying its cooperation efforts with related ministries and government offices (e.g. the Ministry of Defense) to ensure the safety of Japan-related ships and Japanese ships. In addition, MLIT is also taking measures to contribute internationally by newly designating foreign ships as escort targets. From July 2009 to March 2010, 627 ships and over 13,000 crew staff were escorted.

## 3 ) Safety measures in ports

With regard to ASEAN countries, training is being implemented regarding safety measures in ports by holding training sessions and conferences with experts. In addition to cooperating with the United States and Australia, measures for improving safety levels in ports continue to progress.

(2) Strengthening and carrying through measures against terrorism in public transportation

MLIT has developed a plan for initial actions when serious incidents happen. Furthermore, MLIT has been carrying out thorough instructions on measures against terrorism and regular inspections during peak seasons and taking the following measures.

1) Promotion of measures against terrorism on railways

In addition to increasing security cameras in railway stations and strengthening patrol security, MLIT is also formulating the establishment and utilization of “security levels” and the “guideline on measures against railway terrorism. At the same time, focusing on “Visible

## I mplementing Anti-Railway-Terrorism Measures that center on "Visible Security and Passenger Participation"

(Photo1) "Railway security Poster" posted in the station premise.

(Photo 3) Displaying tickers at station platforms to request cooperation in finding suspicious articles

(Photo 4) Patrols by station staff and security guards

(Photo 2) "Terrorism Prevention Partner Badge" carried by station stall staff etc. "Terrorism prevention cooperator badge"

(Photo 5) Highly visible warning messages such as "Surveillance camera in operation" are displayed

(Photo 6) Utilizing the emergency call button when finding suspicious articles (When to use it is specified as "When finding suspicious articles" in the instruction.)

Security and User Participation, $ ^{1} $ measures against terrorism are being pushed forward.