Is 'Walkable' Powerless Against the Heat?

Recently, I have been invited more often to participate in initiatives called 'walkable'.
Creating towns that are fun to walk in. Shifting from car-centric to people-centric. I personally believe that direction is correct, and I am actually involved in several projects on the ground.

It was about two or three weeks ago, when I was touring the Ginza and Marunouchi areas in Tokyo with a friend.
We were tired from walking, and we laughed as we said this to each other.

'We talk about being walkable, but it's so hot that we're just walking between commercial facilities and underground passages.'

While laughing, I was thinking about it seriously in my heart.
In this country, which will likely get hotter and hotter, is it okay to keep saying 'walkable' without thinking?

As I was thinking about this, this week, Masanobu Okazaki of Ogal in Shiwa Town, Iwate Prefecture, wrote an article that addressed this very issue head-on.
I nodded vigorously, so today I will start by writing about that.

'Towns are not losing to homes, they are losing to roofs.'

Okazaki's point was thrilling.

In a Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism document, there was an expression that 'towns are losing to homes,' referring to the decline in the rate of going out. In response to that, Okazaki says this: The opponent the town lost to is not the home.

Because that's how it is, he says. People are going out just fine. Shopping mall parking lots are full, underground malls are overflowing with people, and food courts have no empty seats. Far from staying home, everyone is walking quite a distance.
However, they are only walking under roofs.

What the town is losing to is not the home, but the roof.

And under the roof, there is always air conditioning. In other words, the outdoors has lost to air conditioning.

If you change one character in the diagnosis, the prescription changes. If it lost to the home, it becomes a discussion about motivation to go out. If it lost to the roof, it becomes a discussion about the outdoor thermal environment.

This point accurately identified the discomfort I felt in Tokyo.
While we talk about 'towns that make you want to walk,' have we not left the prerequisite, 'walkable temperatures,' out of the discussion?

Okazaki's answer was the tree canopy

So, what should we do? The answer Okazaki presented was the shade of trees, the tree canopy.

In Europe, a rule of thumb called the '3-30-300 rule' is spreading. Seeing three trees from your window, having a 30% regional tree canopy cover, and having a park within 300 meters.
What is being counted here is not the area of greenery, but the tree canopy—that is, only what creates shade.

Japan's indicators are different. We count 'greenery ratio' by including the area of green spaces and even water surfaces. Therefore, even if it is rich in greenery in terms of numbers, it does not necessarily mean there is shade above the heads of people actually walking.
Things that are not measured do not become goals, and things that do not become goals do not get budgets.

And Okazaki writes this: Lawns look good in a year, but tree shade takes 20 years. The single-year budget system is structurally bad at handling assets that take 20 years.
That is precisely why we need to involve entities that can have a 20-year plan—private businesses that do business in that location for a long time—as stakeholders from the beginning.

I completely agree.
On top of that, I was remembering another solution.

In Taiwan, the streets themselves have roofs.

This is also a story I heard from an acquaintance, but if you have ever walked in Taiwan, you probably already know about it.
In Taiwanese cities, there is a space called a "qilou" (arcade).

The ground floor of the building is set back from the street, with the upper floors overhanging it. It forms a continuous walkway where pedestrians can pass in front of shops, lined with pillars and covered by a roof.
It is a semi-outdoor pedestrian space born to cope with the climate of intense sunlight and sudden squalls. In Taiwan, it was institutionalized as a building rule during the period of Japanese colonial rule, and it still remains everywhere in the city today.

What is interesting is the nature of this space.
A qilou is private property owned by the building owner. Nevertheless, it is opened as a public sidewalk and is legally treated as a "sidewalk." Even the owner is not allowed to block it.
It is a public space that is also private property.

And this is the decisive point: the activities of the storefronts bleed out into the qilou.
Products are lined up, chairs are brought out, and shop staff sit there. Because there is a roof, business can move outside. Pedestrians pass through that atmosphere while avoiding the sun.

In other words, the qilou is not only a countermeasure against the heat but also a device for vibrancy.

What is the difference between a mall roof and a qilou roof?

There is something I want to make clear here.
It is not as simple as just saying, "We should just put up a roof."

Shopping malls have roofs. Underground malls have roofs. They are comfortable. But there is no "town" in those spaces.
The placement of tenants is decided by the operator, the use of the walkways is managed, and the atmosphere of the outside world is blocked off. It is comfortable, but it is homogeneous, and it is the same scenery in every city.

The qilou is different.
It has a roof, but it is open to the outside. The wind blows through, you can hear sounds, and you can smell the rain. And above all, each shop owner uses their own storefront as they like. That is why the character changes as you walk.
Even under the same roof, a managed roof and a roof that exudes the town are completely different things.

Mr. Okazaki wrote that comfort is not just about shade, but about the "contrast between shade and sunlight." You cannot walk if everything is in the sun, but people do not want to stay long if everything is in the shade.
When walking through a qilou, you experience exactly that. Light shines in between the pillars, and if you cross the street, you step into the sun. It is precisely because it is not completely closed off that this contrast is created.

How to bring this into Japanese towns

Of course, I do not think we can simply import the Taiwanese system as it is.
Japan also has a history of "gangi" (covered walkways) and arcades, but the rule of "opening private building land as a sidewalk" like the qilou has not taken root.

Even so, there are things we can learn from this.

One is to think about heat countermeasures from the building side as well.
Widening roads and planting greenery—those are the jobs of the administration. But how to build the first floor of a building is the job of the private sector. Deepening the eaves, setting the first floor back a little, creating room for people to stay in front of the shop. The accumulation of such efforts by each individual shop will change the walkability of the town.

The other is not to treat creating shade and creating vibrancy as separate tasks.
The excellence of the qilou lies in the fact that the heat countermeasure serves as a place for business at the storefront. Instead of creating shade just for the sake of shade, you create shade as a set with the reason for people to be there.

And this connects to what I have been thinking about for a long time.
Creating shade is not just the job of the administration. Whether it is growing trees over 20 years or opening up a storefront, it is only possible because there are people who continue to do business there for a long time.
I think that is exactly what Mr. Okazaki meant when he wrote, "I want to attract business operators who are prepared to commit to 20 years."

Making walkable temperatures a premise for discussion

I will continue to be involved in walkability work.
I still believe that direction is not wrong.

However, from now on, I want to ask this question.
Can this town be walked in on a midsummer afternoon?

Before widening sidewalks. Before drawing up circulation routes. First, whether that road is a road that can be walked on a July afternoon.
Whether it is a tree canopy, eaves, or a semi-outdoor space like a qilou, the method does not matter. The point is whether we have created a state where people can be outdoors.

No matter how many 'walkability-inducing features' you place on a street that is too hot to walk on, people will not come.
Conversely, if the temperature is walkable, people will naturally come outside. The story of how Mr. Okazaki increased sales by 1.85 times just by shifting the festival schedule by three weeks proves this.

I think it is time to stop mindlessly chanting the word 'walkable'.
Creating walkable cities in hot countries. Implementing the concrete methods for that, one by one. I believe that is the real subject of walkability from here on out.