Is the No-Go Zone “Uninhabitable”?

The Press, inside Japan and around the world, has labeled the 20km no-go-zone around Fukushima Daiichi “uninhabitable”. In a strict sense, the word means “unfit to live in”. In the words of fellow ANS Social Media member Mark Norsworthy, “’Uninhabitable,’ to me and I suspect to most, conjures the thought ‘if people go there, they will die’…Desolate wastelands, completely devoid of and hostile to life.” I believe Norsworthy’s notion is precisely what the Press is intending. Anyone who has followed this blog, and/or kept a close eye on the Japanese news reports about the no-go zone can see that the term uninhabitable is inappropriate. Actually, we might better define the no-go zone as a place the Japanese government has decided no-one is allowed to live, for the time being. “Off limits” would be perhaps a better phrase for the situation. The no-go zone was established rather arbitrarily by former P.M. Kan who essentially used a grade-school compass to mark off the area on a map, encompassing all our parts of seven municipalities. At least some of the no-go zone is eminently habitable…and habitable right now! At least one of the zone municipalities (Kawauchi Village) has caught on to this fact and wants to re-open their community to repopulation in March. They plan on having sufficient support infrastructure in place by April. Only Futaba and Okuma, both adjacent to F. Daiichi, have contamination levels so high that it could take 30-50 years before repopulation will be permitted. The other six communities could be repopulated as soon as 3 years, given Tokyo’s restrictive standards. Should the Fukushima no-go-zone be termed “uninhabitable”? Of course not. It’s a politically determined “off limits” area.