Archive for 'Map' Category

a new hotel open near Ueno station

A new hotel “Life Tree” opened near Ueno station, which is one of the oldest and hub stations in central area in Tokyo on this Feb.2nd.(http://www.lifehotels.jp/ueno/)

It takes about 5 minutes to Ueno station from the new hotel. The station area is home to a lot of  popular tourists’ destinations such as traditional Japanese-western restaurants,  Ueno park, the most popular cherry- blossom veiwing spot in Tokyo,  Ueno Zoo, art museums, national museums, Kaneiji temple, Ame-yoko old shopping street,and so forth.   And  ueno is close to other popular areas, such as  Asakusa, Ginza, Yanaka and others.

The foreigen tourists’ number exceed 19 million

Keiichi Ishii, the Minister of Land, Infrastructure, Transport. and Tourism (MILT) declared that the total number of foreigners visiting Japan thsi year as of Dec.19 has exceeded 19,000,000  on Dec.22nd. (http://www.mlit.go.jp/en/index.html)

The number 19 million is already higher than the total number of the visitors in the year 2014 which was 13,41 million and reflects the rapid ongoing growth of the number of foreigners in Japan. This year 2015, the total number in the first half of year was 9,14 million and the verocy seems accelerating.

The sources of the growth are something like the week Yen rate,  relaxiations of  visa systems, the expansions of  objects of duty free items for foreign tourists, and so forth. The Japanese government  now has decided to increase the total budgets for tourism related arrangements from this year’s 10,390 million yen to 24,550 million yen (+14580 million yen).  This abrupt and huge increase implies the huge expectation of the government of the growing inbound markets and revenues created by the related industries.

 

Imerial Palace Inui Street temprorarily open

The “Inui-dori “(Inui Street) in the Imperial Palace in Chyoda-ward, Tokyo was temporarily open to the public Dec.5-9th. (http://www.kunaicho.go.jp/event/inui.html)

Totally, 202,820 people visited the street  on the five open days with 28,000-45,000 visitors each single day.  The Imperial Palace in Chiyoda-ward is now  a quite popular tourist destination visited by tourists including  foreigners, even though the open area are limited. The popularity might increase even more from now on.

 

Hiyoridai Big Bridge finally completed 49 years since the launch

Hiyoridai Big Bridge was finally completed 49 years after the lauch of its project on this Oct.17th.

The bridge is 290m long and connects Yashirominami and Hiyoridai in Tashiro-ku, Sendai City, Miyagi pref. for the traffic convenineces to the area of  Yagiyama Dobutsu Koen station (Yagiyama Zoo station) .  The city mayor Okuyama says, “The bridge finished upon the grand opening of the Tozai Line, and we expect people to use the service for long from now on.”.  Some citizens passed the bridge in the opening ceremoy and took a walk there.

 

 

The “big” Silver Week for the first time in 6 years

The “Silver week”(continous public holidays of a couple of days in  September) of this year 2015 was of  5 straight public holydays , which was the longest one in over  past  six years. The new law of public holidays can make fluctuation  continuous or continual  holidays depending on situations each year and 2008 was the first longest silver week of 5 days since the legal changes. And after the one this year, the next longest week will come in 11 years from now in 2026 according to the calendar.

2009年、2015年
9月
日	月	火	水	木	金	土
13	14	15	16	17	18	19
20	21	22	23	24	25	26

This year, the days of 19 th (Sat) -23rd (Wed.)  were all holidays ! And a lot of people enjoyed the “big” Silver Week. For example, the number of tourists to Kanazawa, where  the new Hokuriku Shinkansen (Bullte Trains)services started this March, and Ishikawa Pref. as a whole, and its  neighbouring prefectures of Toyama and Fukui, all of which are part of Hokuriku or  the North Central region, increased by 4 times compared to the number  of the same time last year.

Hokkaido Shinkansen’s grand opening next March

JR Hokkaido and JR East Japan jointly announced on Sep. 16 that  they were going to launch the remarkable new services of  the Hokkaido Shinkansen (The Bullet Train services in Hokkaido )  on March 26th 2016.

The hisotorically new services of the Hokkaido Shinkansen will provide totaly 13 round-trips of  “Hayabusa”and “Hayate” cars between Tokyo and Shin-hakodatehokuto (about 146km) on a daily basis.  10 out of them will be for the full distance and one for Sendai station-Shin-hakodatehokuto station, one for Morioka station- Shin-hakodatehokuto, and one for Shin-aomori station- Shin-hakodatehokuto station. The “E5 series” of JR East and the “H5 series” of JR Hokkaido will be used as the cars of the new lines.   The will include economy classes , Green Cars’ and the Grand-Place seats.

The last BlueTrain finishing its operation in March

The “Blue Trains” are  popular express trains  with sleeping berths that launched operation in 1958. Most of the Blue Train series have terminated services due to decrepitude or old systems. The only remaining in service is “Hokutosei”(/The Polar Star) that runs between Ueno  station in Tokyo and Sapporo station in Hokkaido. And Hokutosei, the Last Blue Train,  is terminating its service in this March 14th because of aging and the need for JR to rearrange its railroad tables and systems for the plans of  the upcoming bullet train services in Hokkaido.

A lot of railroad fans take travels using Hokutosei or take its photos  sparing the short and precious remaining days of the Blue Trains.

Tokyo Marathon 2015 held, with about 36,000 participants

“Tokyo Marathon 2015” was held on Feb.22 in Tokyo. (http://www.tokyo42195.org/2015en/)  That was the 9th of the annual events with about 36,000 participating runners.

The course covered some central parts of Tokyo starting at the front of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government building.  Iidabashi~Hibiya Park~Shinagawa(turinig point)~Ginza~Azumabashi(turning point)~Toyosu(the Tokyo fish market is moving in here)~Tokyo Bigsight.

The runner of the Marathon Men finished first was Endeshaw Negesse from Ethiopia with the time record of 02:05:59 and that of Marathon Women was Birhane Dibaba from Ethopia at 02:23:15.  The first runner of Marathon Wheelchair men was Kota Hokinoue from Japan at 01:30:21 and that of Marathon Wheelchair Women was  Wakako Tsuchida from Japan at 01:46:28. There were some other categories of marathons in the event, all of which were popular. More than 34,000 runners successfully finished the total courses.

The 20th anniversary of “1.17”,the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake

This year we Japanese people commemorated the 20th anniversary of the Great hanshin-Awaji Earthquake on the January 17th.  In the damaged areas, municipalities hosted special commemorative ceremonies and private societies also hosted events sush as charity music conserts and so forth.  Kobe City, Nishinomiy City, Itami City and others in Hyogo Pref,  Osaka, Kyoto and other rigions and areas in the western part of Japan keep helping sufferers and their bereaved  families of the victims.  ( http://19950117hyogo.jp/other/),(http://www.city.kobe.lg.jp/foreign/index.html)

Children who were born in that year of disaster now have come of age this year. TV shows, dramas, articles and even personal blogs featuring this anniversary and related events are around. Though all the places and areas have miraculously recovered from the damages and rebuilt so well, we still retain the sadness and would keep consoling the souls of the victims and strive for improving the situations for even better.

 

 

BRT will be introduced in Tokyo for Olympics 2020

Tokyo Metropolis announced a new plan of introducing a BRT(bus rapid transit ) system in the central areas of Tokyo and its waterfront areas  in preparation for the upcoming Tokyo Olympics in 2020 on 29th.

The first od series of new bus routes will be one between Shinbashi and Toranomon this year, and the total plan is scheduled to be finished in 2019.  The central areas, such as Toranomon and Ginza and will be connected to the waterfront ones,such as Harumi and Ariake,and Odaiba where the Olympic village is to be built, with about 4 km distances in about 10 miutes by bus due to the new BRT using the Beltline No.2. The public traffic and transportation services are expected to be much more convenient to move around in polular  parts in Tokyo in coming years.

Hakone enjoys more than 20 million visitors

Hakone, one of the most popular tourists’ destinations and hot spring resort  in Kanagawa Pref. near Mt. Fuji declared  it had been visited by 20,857,000 tourists (increased by 7.3 % compared to the year before) in 2013. (http://www.town.hakone.kanagawa.jp/) The town  visited by more than 20 million tourists for the first time in three years and the first time after the earthquake disaster in 2011 and the number is the highest since 1996.   

The one-day travelers number was 16,140,000 (increased by 9%) and that of those who stayed overnight was 4,717,000 (increased by 1.8 %).  The number of foreign visitors overnight reached 168,000, which the record high and increased by 80.5% compared to the minimum number of 63,000 in 2011 when the disaster occurred. The number of  foreign one-day tourists there is assumed to be about 482,000.  New faclities may be one of the sources that have attracted such high number of  visitors there.  It is said the primary sources of such an increase in the number may be the depreciation of Yen these days and relaxations of  visa conditions to tourists from asean countries. The number of people from US, China, Korea, Taiwan, and southeast Asian countries  visiting Hakone is amazingly increasing. The upcoming Tokyo Olympics may be a source of  such rising popularity of some area in Japan as well.

 

Cherry blossoms’ full bloom in Japan

In Japan, we have full bloom of  cherry blossoms in many rigions by the end of March this year.   In Kansai (the Western part of Japan), beautiful combinations of cherryblossoms and old cultural buildings, sush as temples and paths are seen.

In Kanto(the Eastern part of Japan) ,where full bloom situation was recognized by March 29th,  a lot of people enjoy the coloful cherry blossoms in various places, such as Ueno Park, Inokashira Park, Shinjuku Gyoen Park, Sumida River ,and other popular  cherry blossom viewing spots and facilities.

Mt. Fuji officially recommended as a World Cultural Heritage Site

ICOMOS  resolved to recommend Mr.Fuji, the highest mountain of Japan and a popular tourists’ destination which is thought to be one of Japan’s symbol,  and its related areas as a World Cultural Heritage Site on May 1st. (http://www.icomos.org/fr/)

ICOMOS has authority to recommend candidates of a World Heritage Site to UNESCO(http://www.unesco.org/new/en/), and  as once such a candidate is recommended, it is highly probable that candidate is to be designated as  such a Site.

Therefore, Mt. Fuji is highly supposed to be designated at the UNESCO World Heritage Committee which is to be held from June 16th and on in Cambodia. So many people, the Japanese government, municipal governments, and tourism related industries, and others are all excited and a huge expectation.

ICOMOS excluded one area of Miho-no-Matsubara  from the object of recommendation, as the area is remote and apart from Mt. Fuji itself.Still the Council for Cultural Affairs which is the advisory committee for the Commissioner of Agency for Cultural Affairs retains that area as a part of the candidate and expects the perfect designation.

Shibuya station will change drastically

Shibuya station which currently is used by  Toyoko-line, Yamate-line, Ginza-line, Inokashira-line, Denentoshi-line, Hanzomon-line, and Fukutoshin-line is going to undergo a drastic  remodelling on this March 16th. The station will be a totally underground facility.

A subway, Fukutoshin-line and  Toyoko-line will start  mutual exchange operation services, which will shorten traveling time a lot to serve passengers better. Then, Yokohama, Shibuya, Shinjyuku, and Ikebukuro areas will be “directly” connected and more passengers are expected to use those new services. http://www.tokyometro.jp/en/index.html   http://www.tokyu.co.jp/global/index.html http://www.jreast.co.jp/e/index.html

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