The Area on Architectural Planning and Management studies how the physical and social quality of the architectural environment is related to the activities of the users. Legislative regulations in Japan regarding building standards mainly follow the Building Standard Law, which provides a minimal standard at the stage of building construction; it doesn’t fully cover how the building is used after completion. Therefore, there are some elements that show insuffi cient consideration regarding people’s health and welfare. Thus, we need to obtain data that can be used as groundwork for creating standards and guidelines to fi ll those gaps, and for supplying people with the information they need to safeguard their own health. We mainly target buildings that are constructed for one of the three purposes mentioned below:
The first category comprises buildings that the “Act on Maintenance of Sanitation in Buildings” covers. Office buildings that are larger than a certain scale are included in the category. It is true that the Act does have provisions that protect the health of the users. In recent years, however, the number of buildings that do not conform to the management standard of indoor air hygiene level (relative humidity, etc.) is increasing; the causes of the problem are to be determined so that steps toward a solution can be taken.
Residential buildings (the second category) are fundamental to public health and welfare. Japan, which has no Housing Act like those in other developed countries, has many problems with its residential buildings. Taking into account the requirements for healthy housing listed by WHO, we are confronted with a wide range of themes, for example the “sick house syndrome,” condensation, mold, and house adaptation for the elderly and disabled.
Also targeted in our research work are construction planning and building management for facilities that provide health services, such as hospitals and social welfare facilities. In such facilities, offering the right environment for treatment and recuperation, and providing effi cient and eff ective health services are both aspects of health care need to be taken into account.