The Ecosystem Screams -- Disconnection Chronicled by Road Improvements and Airport Expansion (2002)

The Ecosystem Screams -- Disconnection Chronicled by Road Improvements and Airport Expansion (2002)

In 2002, many public projects such as new roads and airport expansions were being planned in Japan in the name of regional development and infrastructure improvement. In the midst of such a tide of development, the activities of environmental assessment firms responsible for "vegetation surveys" and "biological impact studies" emerged as a mere glimmer of hope. However, the records of their orders sometimes meant "testimony of the destruction of nature.

Road construction cuts down mountain slopes and fills in valleys and streams, severing the corridors of life that connect forests, rivers, and satoyama. Airport runway expansion displaces wetlands, tidal flats, and grasslands - habitats for insects, waterfowl, migratory birds, and aquatic life that once inhabited them. Such development could fundamentally destroy species diversity, ecological connectivity, and the local natural environment itself. The "survey of vegetation and ecosystems" and "order for biological impact study for airport expansion" reported in the article were the very sites of such concerns.

However, as of 2002, the system was still inadequate. Although environmental considerations for large-scale projects became a legal obligation under the Environmental Impact Assessment Law (EIA Law) enacted in 1997, in reality there were many cases in which the procedures were disregarded because of the "development first" mentality.

The original purpose of environmental assessment was not simply to "record damage" after the fact, but to predict and evaluate the impact on the ecosystem in advance and prevent destruction as much as possible. After the revision of the system, the "biological environment" itself, such as the habitats of plants and animals, vegetation, and the state of the ecosystem, is now explicitly included in the assessment, and regional characteristics and the opinions of residents and experts are also reflected in the assessment.

Nevertheless, assessment and prediction are not universal. There are always limits to the scope of the study, the methodology, and the judgment of "how much impact is acceptable. And in many cases, that debate has taken a back seat to the weight of "economics" and "convenience.

The environmental assessment companies introduced in this article are probably those who stood between nature and human society and tried to record the last voice of the ecosystem in the interstices of such systems. Behind the "development" of roads and airports, forests, wetlands, and other living creatures are quietly disappearing. This is not merely a "side effect" of development, but a memory of the deep disconnect after the balance between civilization and nature has been broken.