Kondadai - forest in the city

(This article is not about solar sharing, but the topic is at least as important.)

Kondadai is a piece of forest about 4 km from Tsukuba station in the city of Tsukuba, Ibaraki prefecture.

Kondadai is one of few remaining patches of wild land in Tsukuba. Despite being surrounded by houses and fields, this small jungle has ecosystem rich enough to provide habitat to birds of prey. Hawks (ohtaka) and buzzards (sashiba) are both classified as "near threatened species" on the Red List of Japan's Ministry of Environment. Presence of endangered hawks has helped prevent development in the area so far, but future is uncertain.

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Besides rich natural environment, there are also cultural assets in Kondadai - ruins of Konda castle. They are very mysterious ruins though - buried under the grasses, you have to fully employ your imagination to spot them.

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Kondadai is now protected thanks to the efforts of Kayoko Takahashi and her Association for the protection of Kondadai ecosystem 金田台の生態系を守る会. On Sunday Nov. 10, 2013, I took part in a study walk through the forest, regularly organized by the Association.

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Kondadai is, in a way, a classic story of conflict between two forces: nature conservation versus urban development. In the story, developers are blamed for insensitive destruction of nature in the name of progress, and environmentalists are blamed for hindering development by uselessly trying to protect every tree and bird.

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But when I was walking through the Kondadai forest on Sunday, I was thinking of it as neither The Environmentalist nor The Developer. Instead, I tried to look at Kondadai through the lens of a local resident.

I naturally took the resident view because Kondadai reminded me of Brezina, a forest park in my hometown back in Slovakia.

This is Brezina in January 2013 - the last time I was there.

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I grew up in Trencin, a small town in western Slovakia, in a typical housing area of 7-store apartment buildings built in communist era. You could find similar neighbourhood all around the country, there was nothing special about the place. What made it unique for me was the forest park Brezina, 5 minutes on foot from our apartment.

I used to go to Brezina for a walk since kindergarden through elementary school to university. As a student, I would walk 45 minutes to the station through the forest instead of taking 20-minute bus. Today, whenever I go back to Slovakia, the first thing to do is to go for a walk to Brezina.

I can't imagine my hometown without Brezina. Beloved by the residents, it is one of the greatest assets of the town. It's value far exceeds the economic value of the trees or the land, or the housing that could be created in its place.

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I don't live in Tsukuba any more, but if I did, I would love to have a place like Kondadai close to my home.

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If Kondadai was gently turned into a forest park, without driving away hawks and owls and squirrels but available for people to rest and children to play, it would be of priceless value to people living around.

As the last oasis of trees and silence in central Tsukuba, it should be worth protection even without the near threatened hawks nesting there. Preserving Kondadai forest would would not only protec the flora and fauna, but would make central Tsukuba a more enjoyable place to live for humans.