A worldwide introduction of renewable energy has been required to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Concomitantly, this has caused conflict between renewable energy development and local communities over landscape changes. This study aims to clarify the factors of conflict and find a way of conflict management. A case study on Japan is used, where a solar rush occurred due to the feed-in tariff (FIT) system. We analyze the public reasons to worry about renewable energy and the spatial characteristics of its locations. A socio-spatial approach is used by first utilizing a qualitative survey based on questionnaires and interviews with the local governments to understand the awareness regarding the issues, and then utilizing a quantitative survey on the location changes to solar power by using GIS. The results suggest that there were links between local governments’ concerns and the location of solar power concentration. These results show that conflicts over renewable energy are not unavoidable and may be managed by local governments that can act as intermediaries with sufficient knowledge of the local communities.

Community gardens offer broad research opportunities and analytical resources encompassing urban planning to environmental sustainability, food systems, and social capital. However, little is known about the knowledge structure and research development related to community gardens. This study presents an in-depth bibliometric performance analysis and visual scientific mapping analysis of the literature on community gardens by examining 487 published papers selected from the Web of Science database. The results indicated a considerable rise in research papers in this subject area from 2012 onwards, with most contributions from the United States. Studies from high-income countries accounted for 93.22%, and 38 countries have cooperated 167 times in this field. “Health” is the most frequent keyword, and the terms “ecosystem services” has been gaining popularity over the last five years. A combination of co-citation clustering and keyword co-occurrence clustering analysis identified three major research themes in the field of community gardens: “ecosystem services and disservices”, “multidimensional association”, and “sustainable garden systems”. The development of ecosystem value assessment frameworks, the establishment of region-wide soil monitoring databases, accounting for the cost-effectiveness of nature-based solutions, the integration of garden systems into smart cities, and the integration of water management into regulation will be important future research directions regarding community gardens. Overall, this study provides scholars with a systematic and quantitative understanding of community gardens.

Following the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, people who had experienced social isolation during the epidemic became more concerned about the function of public open spaces in their communities. In developing China, community gardens have not been included in the urban planning system. This study explores whether community residents support the construction of community gardens on public land for collective gardening activities and the reasons for the formation of their willingness. The subjects of this study are residents of three urbanized residential communities in Wuhan, Hubei Province. Questionnaires were distributed in the communities via the internet to assess residents’ willingness to build community gardens. Three hundred eighty-two completed and valid questionnaires were collected. Descriptive statistics and chi-square tests were used to evaluate the categorical variables. The results showed that 82.5% of respondents expressed support for the construction of community gardens, while 17.5% held the opposite view. Respondents who were female, elderly, and had minors in the household had a higher percentage of supportive statements. Living in different communities, education levels, and monthly income had no significant impact on the results. Community evaluation and horticultural experience had a significant impact on the results. Finally, we discuss the main reasons for willingness. In addition, we found that not all supporters were willing to spend money or time on community gardens. The results of this study are significant for community management decision-making and spatial planning.

The biodiversity and carbon dioxide absorption function of forests have received attention due to global warming. However, most of the world’s forests are general production forests. Since production forests are maintained by production activities, a decrease in production or abandonment of management leads to a decline in forest functions and increases the risk of disasters such as landslides. Against this background, the retention approach has been proposed as a way to convert general production forests into forests with enhanced environmental functions, but it has rarely been applied due to technical and cost barriers. This study focuses on cost barriers and examines the possibility of introducing a retention approach to converting production forests to environmental forests, using Japan as a case study. About 70% of Japan’s land area is covered with forests, 40% of which are production forests. However, due to the sharp decline in demand for timber in recent years and price competition with imported timber, the selling price of timber has fallen below the cost of managing production forests, and the management of many production forests has been abandoned. The dilemma is that the retention approach applied to the wood production process cannot be applied to forests where production activities are stagnant. Therefore, we explored the possibility of recovering the necessary costs with carbon credits that are available in the Japanese market. We calculated the cumulative carbon stocks of carbon dioxide in production forests by age, using intensity, and estimated how many years after planting the combined costs of normal production forests management and the retention approach would balance out. Our calculations show that even if carbon credits were sold at the lowest market price, the balance of payments would be balanced about 30 years after planting, resulting in a net profit from the sale of the wood.

Allotment gardens (AGs) are widely used in metropolitan areas around the world to offer agricultural opportunities to urban residents. However, there are not enough individual plots for residents to rent for urban gardening, and research on AGs from a city-wide perspective is ongoing. In addition, AGs have a long history in Tokyo, yet few international studies on the current situation of AGs have addressed Asian cities. Thus, this study intends to analyze the provision of AGs and its influencing factors in Tokyo. Using ArcGIS combined the 472-points dataset created by geo-coordinate mapping with urban GIS data to reveal spatial characteristics in four dimensions. Results demonstrate that most AGs are in the urbanization promotion area; most municipalities have AGs; AGs are concentrated within 20 to 30 km from the center of Tokyo; the AGs’ clusters are located at the municipal boundaries. We conducted multiple regressions to determine the influencing factors at the municipal level, with the provision that AGs are related to population density, land price, and the ratio of productive green space. The policy implication of this study is that policymakers need to consider the siting strategy of AGs based on spatial characteristics of AGs.

Many local governments that were damaged by the tsunami caused by the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake designated disaster hazard areas based on Article 39 of the Building Standards Act in coastal areas and restricted the construction of residential buildings. Residents who lived in the disaster hazard area were forced to move to their place of residence. In this study, we targeted households who lived in the Ogatsu district of Ishinomaki City before the earthquake and moved with the group relocation project. We selected two cases: the households that selected the Futago housing complex outside the Ogatsu and the Ogatsu Central housing complex inside the Ogatsu. The purpose of this study is to clarify the effects of differences in the relocation destinations and living environments of residents on their satisfaction and the feeling of reconstruction. In particular, we focused on the following three points and proceeded with the analysis; (1)the effect of convenience on satisfaction, (2)the living environment factor that affects satisfaction, (3)the effect of the distance from the sea to the choice of residence. The population of the Ogatsu district has declined the most among all the affected areas. Although there were 1,142 households in the disaster hazard area, only 192 new housing units were built. In particular, households in the former central area, which are not fishing villages, had two primary options for the group relocation project: the housing complex in the former central area or outside the Ogatsu district. Futago is the largest housing complex in the peninsula area. It is located in the city planning area, has high mobility, and is close to shops, schools, and hospitals. Ogatsu Central is located outside the city planning area, and there are no public transportation or shops. We revealed the following points; (1) living environment affects satisfaction The factor for choosing the area of residence for households living in the Futago was that it was far from the sea and convenient to move. However, the evaluation after living was influenced by the living environment rather than convenience. Ogatsu central is inconvenient. However, since the satisfaction level was almost the same as that of the Futago, convenience does not necessarily affect the satisfaction of living. (2) Distance from the sea affects the choice of place of residence The factors for choosing a place of residence for households living in the Ogatsu Chuo were an attachment to the place and proximity to the sea, and the "landscape" significantly affected the feeling of reconstruction and satisfaction. It is presumed that the choice of place of residence had a preference for the sea. "Distance from the sea" had the most significant influence on the selection factors of the residences living in both housing complexes, and the feeling of reconstruction and satisfaction after residence were similar. Also, there was an extreme difference in the convenience of the two housing estates, but this did not necessarily affect the choice of place of residence and satisfaction. As a result, residents who chose a location close to the sea were not much different from the highly convenient housing complex, even though it was less convenient. Residences living on a hill with a view of the sea were satisfied with the landscape, and residences inland were satisfied with the living environment.