Aging of population and housing renewal in the inner areas of Tokyo

Abstract

The aging of population is defined as the rise of the percentage of elderly people in an area. An aging population brings various problems to a neighborhood through its distortion of the age structure of the local population. First, an aging population hinders the regeneration of the population of the area. Second, the systems of facilities and services for daily life are disrupted by the decrease in the number of residents and by changes in land use. Third, many residents become unable to continue living in the area because of the disruption in social systems. This paper focuses upon the influence of housing renewal on the aging of the population in the inner areas of Tokyo. The analysis of statistical materials and an interview survey concerning the living conditions of residents were conducted. The results can be summarized as follows: The combination of the narrow areas of residential sites and land-use regulation causes certain difficulties in the housing renewal which would enable three generations of a family to live together. When a house is rebuilt, the area of the legal site must be reduced because of serious site regulations such as restricted areas, the absence of an adjacent street, and the confused relationships of landholding. Therefore residents of the younger generation are unable to rebuild their houses and leave the neighborhood. The resulting outflow of younger residents causes an increase in the number of households consisting of the elderly only and accelerates the aging of the neighborhood population. If such a trend of inner areas continues, the lack of a young generation of residents and the abandonment of residential sites will lead to the emergence of undesirable land use in the inner areas in the near future.