Rebuilding Urban Japan After 1945

Over 200 Japanese cities were bombed during the Second World War. As most buildings were of wood, both incendiary and atomic bombs produced vast destruction, turning those cities into even more of a blank slate than bombed European cities. As in Europe, Japanese recon-struction was surprisingly rapid, but it took on distinctly Japanese forms. Town planning was, with few exceptions, highly centralized, and planners relied more on land-readjustment schemes and road planning than on dramatic land-use changes, though Japanese planners could look back to precedents for large-scale planning from the 1920s and the occupation of Manchuria. Usually, however, the character of the rebuilt cities was determined more by private builders than public projects. In most cities dense neighbourhoods reappeared, providing a sense of both vitality and chaos, though there were some notable exceptions, including the Peace Park and Boulevard in Hiroshima and the unique mixture of Japanese and American influences in Okinawa. Even the style of the most noted architects tended towards a mixture of traditionalism and modernism. This book - the first of its kind in the English language - therefore examines the evolution of planning and architecture in Japan after 1945 and compares it with that of Europe.