A Study on Building Tsunami Evacuation Towers

摘要

After disastrous earthquake and following tsunami on March 11,2011 in northeast part of Japan, many waterfront municipalities began to more seriously consider hazard mitigation for the earthquakes and tsunami in near future.The construction of tsunami evacuation facilities, relatively new tsunami countermeasures that draw attention after the Great East Japan Earthquake, has been widely promoted, and Nankoku city in Kochi prefecture has constructed fourteen tsunami evacuation towers along the coast.This paper discusses the issues of building tsunami evacuation towers as a major part of tsunami countermeasures constructed in Nankoku City.We review the construction process of tsunami evacuation towers in the effort to mitigate the tsunami hazard.Construction of tsunami evacuation tower was conducted in overhasty process mainly because of the budget restriction.Although tsunami evacuation towers were planned to be located considering uniform evacuation distance and time, the discussion with the local community caused variable distribution of towers.Since the gigantic tower structures are primarily designed to be easily recognizable as evacuation facility even in case of urgent situation, the impact on the ordinary rural landscape is almost unconcerned.