Post-urban Sites in Japan and Mexico: Their Appearance and Their Colors

This book is a joint publication of Chiba University / Universidad de Monterrey that collects the results of the QOL section (Quality of Life in overcrowded cities) of the PULI multi-university program (Post Urban Living Innovation Education and Research Program) funded by the Japanese government. The QOL-PULI tackles the overcrowded condition of large congested conurbations that challenges a consolidated metropolitan lifestyle all over the world and casts residents into a post-urban condition. Large social strata also deal with insufficient provision of essential services such as housing and transportation and intolerable living circumstances. The program pursues the creation of agreeable, social, and safe urban environments by working on tangible and intangible components. This book presents the 2015-18 project work progress, with on-site case analyses performed on six locations in Japan and Mexico by the joint QOL team of Chiba University and the Universidad de Monterrey under the direction of Higashi, Pasini, and Suzuki. The graphic documentation presented consists in maps, plans of urban areas, photo-surveys and line-drawings of street-fronts and façades, attempting to capture the intangible qualities of the relics of urban systems in the megacity of Tokyo or in the small towns of urbanized regions of Mexico. The texts by Higashi, Pasini, and Suzuki accompany the unfolding graphic apparatus plotting a critical correspondence between superficial appearance and functioning structure of the urban environments for the six sites in Mexico and in Japan.