Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
inaugurate administrative measures to facilitate rehabilitation of its waterways. As
part of this effort, a number of projects have been initiated whose aim is to create or
re-landscape water courses in an ecology-friendly way. As in Yokohama, if not even
more so, the projects are very small in scale, but attempts are made to overcome this
disadvantage by linking them together into corridors along streams and ditches.
In the pioneering project, a 400-metre stretch of stream known as the Muk jima
waterway has been re-landscaped (see Figure 8.3 ). 5 Its concrete banks were replaced
with packed (but not cemented) stone using traditional techniques; and stakes, mats
and baskets were laid along the water edge. The re-landscaping work cost over ¥250
million (about £1 million at the exchange rate of the time, 1993 to 1994). A path
runs down either side of the stream. At one end, the waterway opens out into a
specially created pond whose banks fall within the precincts of the local primary
school, allowing children direct access to the water. At the other end, a mill has been
placed, reconstructed in the local style. To this carefully crafted environment a
number of species of fish and bird have returned, including both kingfishers and the
aburahaya, a sub-species of dace (Leociscus macropus) particularly sensitive to
changes in water quality. Much has been learnt in the short time since the
completion of this project, and local techniques have replaced more expensive
imported methods. The project is largely the work of one man, Sasaki Nobukichi, a
radical advocate of ecology-friendly planning, who has sought to carry forward and
realise his ideas despite opposition from colleagues in the municipal government and
the initial hostility of local residents.
Other projects in Hino show a similar concern for simplicity and lack of artifice.
Several ox-bow formations have been constructed, with carefully designed eddies
and pools forming habitats favoured by fish. Many of the smallest of the irrigation
channels are being landscaped and protected to ensure that they are not
Figure 8.3 The Muk jima waterway in the western outskirts of Tokyo opens out
into a pond whose banks and bed have been designed to provide homes and
breeding grounds for all sorts of aquatic life.
Source: Author's photograph
Search WWH ::




Custom Search