• Journal of the Korean Institute of Landscape Architecture
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• v.42 no.6
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• pp.1-9
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• 2014

Within the urban area, over the past decades unused land and public land such as streams and road sides have given urban residents a space for farming (urban farms). However, because this use is illegal, farming in unused and public lands could cause conflicts between urban farm users and land owners, degrade the quality of the urban landscape and contaminate the environment. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to provide a way of legalizing these farming practices that have been cultivated in unused urban areas and public lands. This study analyzed the status of distribution and use of the urban farms that have been scattered around urban areas in many different forms. The survey was conducted through on-the-spot investigation and in-person interviews with farm users and those who were operating weekend farms in the Siji region of Daegu Metropolitan City. According to the results of this study, urban farms were mainly found in green areas that were easily accessible from residential districts and prohibited from development. It was also revealed that the nearer to the border of the residential districts the sites of urban farms were, the larger the number of urban farms was. When it comes to the type of land use, although the proportion of urban farms located in farmlands was very high, the proportion of those located on state-owned lands such as roads, railroads and streams was also high, over 1/3 of that of the former sites. Among the users of urban farms, the percentage of users who were farming private-owned land for free was highest and that of state-owned land without permission ranked second. Most people who were farming unused lands or state-owned lands without permission, such as streams, roads, railroads, were the elderly. This shows the potential of farms in urban area as leisure activities spaces for the elderly. Even though this study has limitations in that the survey target area was selected in a certain area and the sizes of all urban farms were not measured by surveying apparatus and instruments, it helps to determine the characteristics of use and distribution associated with the spaces of urban farming, and to raise the importance and necessity of legalizing urban farms cultivated illegally in public land.