Posts Tagged "park"

Park walk: Taki no mizu ryokuchi (滝ノ水緑地)

Posted by Christoph on Feb 19, 2010 in Blog | 1 comment

A while ago I went on another park exploration trip. This time I visited the Taki no mizu ryokuchi green space (滝ノ水緑地) in Midoriku, Nagoya (Japan). Please see the bottom of the full post for photos and location.

The park’s name already points out the fact that this is not a standard general-use park, but rather “green space”. Although I could not find any online information about it’s age and plan, it seems like a part of the original landscape was preserved when this area of Nagoya was developed. Therefore, the park is essentially a patch of forest on a hill. On the west side Taki no mizu ryokuchi is surrounded by a residential area. Standing at the entrance you look over a tiny lake and a small waterfront. Roofed seating is provided, as is the free drinking water fountain that can be found in almost any Japanese public park. On one side of the lake, a wooden boardwalk leads into the forest. Inside, you can opt for the short route and return by walking along the other side of the lake. The long route takes you around the back and up the hill on a unpaved forest path. From the top you get a view of the still-in-build motorway on the east of the park and over the residential area. The path then leads you back down some steps back to the entrance.

The park had a great atmosphere and I enjoyed it a lot. The forest, the lack of concrete around the lake, the unpaved paths and the lack of lawn distinguish Taki no mizu ryokuchi from the typical Japanese suburban park. It surprised me to find a place like this in the middle of the dense Japanese suburbs. In my opinion, this kind a of green space offers a great way of experiencing nature within the city. The cost for establishing should be low, as the place stays mostly the same and facilities are added only at the entrance. Leaving the original nature intact has the advantage of mature trees and a natural habitat for flora and fauna. It also means designers don’t have to think hard about how to create ecologically sound living space and can instead focus on connecting it with other green spaces in the area. Yet, this kind of park is a case where advance planning plays a great role. Setting the land aside during development is easy, but in most cases it would be a very costly and time-consuming option to build a forest like this from scratch inside an already developed area.

The park also seems to be rather popular with adults, as I counted more than 10 people during my 2 hours there (on a workday afternoon), all well over 30. A little off the path though, some kids had left behind a kind of “nest” – maybe a forest playhouse in it’s early stages. I didn’t see any urban wildlife, but my exploration was commented on by a variety of birds. Despite the “No fishing” sign I could not see any swimming in the lake.

I was less impressed by the number of signs put up by the park authority. While the “Do not play with balls”-sign so familiar from Sapporo was absent, I counted seven different warning and forbidden signs, including “Don’t dump your cat”, “Don’t dump trash”, “Don’t fish”, “Stay on the path to protect the trees” and conflicting signs such as “Be quiet in the morning” and “Please don’t use the park in the night and in the morning because it annoys the neighbours”. Sure, I understand the need for rules in parks, but having them all on a board at the entrance would be far more elegant in my opinion. Another thing I noticed was the limited accessibility for wheel-chairs. Only the entrance area is barrier free, the ring route around the lake and the forest have steps and narrow points. This said, I guess the park designers had to make a compromise between accessibility and leaving the park as natural as possible. Also, from a point of aesthetics, I would have prefered wooden poles for the boardwalk instead of look-alikes and nylon ropes.