Works in Progress Podcast How to redraw a city: Land readjustment in Japan
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Mar 13, 2026 A tour of Japan's bold urban replanning tool that pooled tiny plots, redrew streets and sold reserve land. It covers how supermajority ballots and profit-sharing solved coordination and free-rider problems. The story links historical rebuilding, postwar scaling and global experiments showing a political-economy approach to remaking cities.
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Land Readjustment Replaced Expropriation In Japan
- Japan solved extreme postwar planning problems by using land readjustment rather than mass expropriation.
- The system pooled plots, redrew boundaries for roads and parks, then redistributed land so owners shared uplift evenly.
Postwar Land Reform Created Fragmented Ownership
- Postwar US-style land reform in Japan fragmented holdings into tiny one-hectare plots, creating severe coordination problems for urban expansion.
- 80% of agricultural land became owner-occupied small plots, mirroring Naples-style dysfunctional development risks.
Tokyo Rebuilt With Readjustment After The Kanto Quake
- After the 1923 Kanto earthquake, Tokyo used land readjustment to redraw streets and build a hierarchical tram network with 40 lines over 200 kilometres.
- Planners saw the project as a triumphant success and it trained a generation of Japanese urban planners.