The Required Collaboration Between Universities and Government Administration in Plans for the Regeneration of Ports and Harbors That Utilize the Appeal of Marine Space

Marine space has a variety of appealing elements such as in use as resorts, for leisure, marine sports, physical distribution and the function involving the flow of people. However, ports and harbors that have lost their physical distribution functions and are steadily declining are on the increase. The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport is attempting to undertake regeneration of such ports and harbors that have lost their vitality from the middle of the 20th century. To date, regeneration plans for ports and harbors have been under the initiative of government administration but today, plans for the regeneration of ports and harbors and measures for revitalizing port towns are being reviewed in various ways including the creative development of communities through participation of the local citizenry and the convening of workshops by NPOs. As a part of this, the Chiba Port and Harbor Office in which the national government invests has begun a trial attempt to launch new projects for the invigoration of port towns through the formation of a program under which plans for the regeneration of ports and harbors and the invigoration of port towns will be undertaken through the collaboration of universities and local administrative governments. As a forerunner to such a model project, a program to form a regeneration plan for Kisarazu Port through the collaboration of Kisarazu and the Department of Oceanic Architecture & Engineering of Nihon University for senior 4th year students with the national government’s Chiba Port and Harbor Office as the moderator has been undertaken. At Nihon University, in the curriculum of Oceanic Architecture, A Planning Studio, 7 teachers and 58 students participated and 14 classes with three hours each week were conducted. This paper introduces the background to this and reports on the status of local contribution by the university.