(2) Activating regional railroads and supporting safety assurance, etc.

While regional railroads not only support the livelihood of the local residents living along the railroads as a means of their daily transport but also play an important role in providing them with public transport of critical importance in supporting regional interaction between tourist resorts. However, their management is in an extremely tough situation. For this reason, the MLIT supports not only the maintenance, etc. of safety facilities by implementing regional public transport securing, management and improvement projects or offering tax incentives but also the construction, etc. of new stations on those local routes that have high potential needs for railway use by implementing projects designed to activate trunk railways, etc.

## (3) Subsidizing regional bus routes

Securing and maintaining means of regional public transport, such as public buses, for the benefit of local residents, particularly those with limited access to transport, such as elderly people and schoolchildren, is of critical importance. To help secure and maintain optimal networks of regional transport tailored to specific regional characteristics and conditions, the government has a policy of providing integrated support to the availability of regional transport services (such as inter-regional bus transport networks Note or bus, demand-responsive and other forms of regional transport closely related to trunk transport networks) under a scheme of shared responsibility with local governments. For other routes, relevant financial measures are taken to enable local governments to maintain them at their own discretion.

## (4) Supporting transport to and from remote islands

To sustain air transportation to remote islands, air carriers extending their air routes to remote islands are granted comprehensive support (budget: airframe purchase grants, operational cost grants, tax and public dues: landing fee alleviation, aviation fuel tax alleviation and so on). Starting from FY2012, airfare discounts for islanders have been subsidized on the air routes eligible for operational cost grants as part of expanding support to transport to and from remote islands.

Remote island sea routes, a vital means of transport to support islanders' daily living, are now extremely tough to economically manage. The running costs of those sea routes that are anticipated in the red and for which no alternative routes are available are subsidized by regional public transport securing, management and improvement projects. In addition, discounted passenger fares for islanders have been subsidized and port and harbor facilities developed to close gaps from other regions and to add to the convenience of the islanders' lives.

In FY2014, 55 remote island air routes were in service, when compared with 285 sea routes available at the end of FY2013 (120 of which are grant-maintained air routes).

## Promoting the Private Urban Development

## 1 Promoting Urban Development by Private Sectors

(1) Promoting urban development by private sectors based on the Specific Urban Reconstruction Emergen-cy Development Area program

## cy Development Area program

While rapidly growing Asian nations have resulted in a proportionate decline in Japan’s international competitiveness, it has become an essential task to provide a powerful boost to the development of the urban areas in the nation’s major cities, a source of impetus to the national growth, in a partnership between the public and private sectors to turn them into attractive urban centers that lure businesses, human resources and more from overseas. To this end, the MLIT singled out 11 areas nationwide as “Specific Urban Reconstruction Emergency Development Areas” in January 2012 to enhance urban international competitiveness. In nine of them (as of the end of March, 2015), development plans were formulated by councils formed in a partnership between the public and private sector.

In Specific Urban Reconstruction Emergency Development Areas, the MLIT supports urban development by private sectors by deregulating the private use of untapped sewage energy sources and the use of road airspaces, offering tax