Urban Development Of Tokio And Planned Multiple Centers

The most dominant subject in 20th century urban planning is how to resolve the growth issue of huge metropolitan regions which was on the agenda even by the end of 19th century. When many observers became aware that the issues arose with the unexpected growth of huge cities were different from the previous urban problems in terms of quality and that new planning forces were required, they discussed about the size of these cities and their structure. The main problems of overgrowing cities include jam in transportation systems (especially in highways), increase in land prices, spending more time to reach workplace and low work performance due to the long journey, reduced access to open areas and rural areas, increased infrastructure work costs, increased air and water pollution, increased health problems, demoralization and increased crime rate. The most well accepted solution for these issues was to promote intensified activities at metropolitan regions named generally as sub-center or satellite city. Sub-centers are the regions which are employment and trade centers apart from the business center, and constantly developed; and where train, metro and bus transits intersect. Satellite cities are newly developed regions or regions which are developed in addition to the existing areas which are separated from metropolitan centers with green areas. In this article, the effect of sub-centers and satellite centers in Tokyo Metropolitan Region is analyzed. First, the development of Metropolitan Planning ideas starting with Ebenezer Howard in 1898 and reach until 1990 was summarized, and then it was concluded that Tokyo region showed a development with multiple centers by analyzing the population and employment data between 1970 and 1995 to determine to what extent the growth structure with multiple centers show itself.