Double circle of density preferences among teleworkers during the COVID-19 pandemic in Tokyo

The spread of teleworking due to the COVID-19 pandemic has led to lifestyle changes for the large city residents, who live and work within their neighborhoods. Understanding how these changes in lifestyle affect residential preferences is important for future urban planning. This study aims to clarify the relationship between population density and relocation intentions using a questionnaire survey conducted in 2020 and 2021 among teleworkers living in Tokyo. The results confirm that population density has a nonlinear effect on residential preferences. Specifically, low-density and appropriately high-density areas are preferred, whereas intermediate-density and overcrowded areas are avoided. Applying this result to an urban structure in which density gradually decreases from the urban center to the outer suburbs, it means that areas with low, high, low, and high residential preferences appear in that order. In other words, a double-circle structure of residential preferences in large cities may exist as a post COVID-19.