Hirafu Community Meetings on Kutchan Town Planning Rules

Many thanks to everyone who filled out and supported our petition to request improvements to the proposed revisions to the Kutchan Town Quasi-City Planning Regulations. 721 people signed up, representing a broad cross section of local resident Japanese and foreigners, overseas owners, folks working in tourism here, tourists, etc. It also included people who are both for and against development, and the common thread is people want more robust town planning process.

We had meetings with both Kutchan Mayor Monji, and also several Kutchan City Councillors. It is not clear at this point whether Kutchan will incorporate our proposals or slow down the process for further review.
Opinions will vary, but my biggest concerns about the current plan are that:

1. The current "Hirafu Master Plan" did not consider parking, traffic, or mountain capacity. It only considered the lift capacity, but there is much more to creating a good resort experience.
2. It does not have any requirements to build usable carpark spaces within the development sites.
3. Kutchan Town is proposing to increase the height limit in middle and lower Hirafu to 16m (from the current 13m). This will encourage land owners to build 5 story condo building, and not houses. More units equals more cars, more traffic, and more congestion!

Kutchan Town is doing two community presentations this week, so come and make your voice heard!
Date：March 3rd（Thu）OR March 4th（Fri）4PM～Location：Hotel Niseko Alpen

For enquiries, please contact:

Kutchan Town Planning Department (Hoshika-san, Yokoyama-san)

TEL:0136-56-8012

MAIL:[email protected]

See Kutchan Town meeting materials here.