2 - Are second-tier metropolises more or less economically affected by urban shrinkage in an age of depopulation? Evidence from the Kansai metropolitan area in Japan

Mass housing vacancy has become a central preoccupation of policy makers in shrinking urban regions. An abundant body of research now explains why and how depopulation processes stir housing abandonment and challenge the capacity of stakeholders to control their impacts on real estate markets, municipal budgets, and household well-being. However, it remains often unclear where and by which degree these processes can reduce private and public wealth. Utilizing  analyses that simulate the repercussions of population losses on housing asset values in the Tokyo and Kansai Metropolitan Area from present day to 2045, our paper aims at showing where and how, within a conurbation as large as Osaka’s in Kansai, the municipalities impoverished by a depreciation of land for residential use triggered by long-term depopulation. According to our analyses, maps and the typologies we subsequently draw, most municipalities should expect losses ranging between 20-60 % until 2045, but the ratios of HAV lost would be higher in the suburbs of East and South Osaka, while the richer municipalities of North Osaka could lose more in quantitative terms. We find that the positive influence of proximity to Central Business Districts by train is less pronounced, due to Kansai’s stronger rates of car commuting. We underline that in Kansai, the geography of impoverishment brought by urban shrinkage duplicate socio-spatial divides that do not reproduce a clear-cut centre-suburb distribution; and we discuss the implication of this configuration for the governance of urban revitalization in polycentric regions and second-tier global cities.