Shin Yokohama Pedestrian Overpass

This weekend I took a trip to the Shin Yokohama Ramen Museum to enjoy some great noodles and a little bit of 1950s atmosphere. On our evening walk toward the JR Shin Yokohama station, we encountered this very large circular pedestrian overpass which appeared to be recently built. The overpass connects pedestrians from the nearby office towers, hotels and housing to the busy train station, which includes platforms for subway, regular trains, and the shinkansen (bullet trains). I've posted on the many small pedestrian overpasses in Yokosuka before - but this example is of a completely larger scale. It's design was modern and sleek with polished metal and frosted glass. The overpass was covered, but was open on the sides enabling views of the station area, and the busy intersection below. There were elevator towers located on all four sides, but the vast majority of users climbed the stairs.

Many urbanists (including myself) usually desire pedestrians on the sidewalks at street level, keeping the city lively and calming traffic. However, in this case I can see that safety and pedestrian travel flow (access speed to the station) dictated the size and scale of the overpass. The large number of pedestrians that approach the station from this busy neighborhood was evident, even at 7PM on a Saturday evening. I'll try to get back to take some more pictures during the day - but here's a little video and some still shots. Also check it out on Google Maps.

Living in Towers

Although there is a strong market for detached single family houses (admittedly on extremely small lots), a lot of Japan's urban residential housing market is accommodated with multi-unit housing. In particular, large tower buildings greater than eight stories are a common site throughout Japan's cities.

Here's a few quick observations about these buildings, and a slideshow of (hopefully) a growing set of images.

Almost all of the towers have outdoor deck space available for each unit. These balconies can be small or large - but aside from providing a place to get fresh air and a view of the city - they are also used extensively to hang clothing to dry. (In Japan I'd guess that about 75% of household clothing is hung to dry instead of machine dried).

Most of the towers have external fire stairs winding down one or more sides of the exterior. I'm assuming this is the fire code here in Yokosuka, because nearly every tower has them - and they are exterior not interior stairs as is typical in the US.

Based on my interpretations of the graphics used in real estate ads, the amount of daylight, the depth of balcony, proximity to train stations, as well as the views provided from the unit are important considerations when buying or renting a unit.

Depending on the setting, some towers have commercial or retail uses in the lower floors.

New towers in Yokosuka appear to have more automobile parking than older towers. Often bicycle parking (on the ground floor, usually in a covered space) is more prevalent than auto parking.

My Favorite TOD in Yokosuka

To westerners, Kurihama is probably best known as the site of Commodore Matthew C. Perry's 1853 landing, which forcibly "opened" Japan to trade with the west.

I like Kurihama for a completely different reason. The station area surrounding the Keikyu Kurihama train station is a lively urban setting with retail, restaurants, commercial and housing uses combined together in such a way that the sidewalks and alleyways spring to life with human activity. The station area is also a major transportation hub, where cars, buses, taxis, bicycles and pedestrians all jostle for space, yet somehow peacefully co-exist.

I certainly have a lot more local train stations area to check out - but so far this one wins hands down for proclaiming a real sense of place. Yes, the architecture is mostly aging 1960s era modern, and there are a lot of signs and billboards and other "clutter" that planners aren't supposed to like -but - there's a real vitality to the small shops that front along the sidewalks. Also - I really like the weather protection provided by the large overhanging canopy that lines the main shopping street. Check out the pictures in my slideshow - and let me know what you think. It may not be beautiful, but it's urban and very functional. In addition - there are a bunch of great locations within easy walking distance - a small beach (site of a park commemorating Perry), Kurihama Flower World, and even urban infill big box retail (another future post).

Hakone Free Pass: Making Transit Fun AND Convenient

Here's a great concept: take an extremely popular tourist destination close to Tokyo - load it up with fantastic public transportation options, (despite the mountainous, low density setting), lump all the transit services together for a reasonable fee - and let people ride it as much as they want for a two-day or three-day pass. That's essentially what you get when you buy the "Hakone Free Pass" from the Odakyu Group Railway Line.

You get the following "seven types of transportation":

1) A historic mountain railway line (Hakone Tozan Line) that takes you to and between many small towns / villages in the Hakone Area.
2) An even more interesting narrow gauge mountain cable car (Hakone Tozan Cable Car) that takes you up the steep slope of the mountain in the town of Gora, and connects to the next system:
3) A mountain "ropeway" (Hakone Ropeway), or (aerial tramway/cablecar) - connecting the mountain's peak to the beautiful Lake Ashi.
4) A sightseeing cruise (Hakone Cruise) following a circular route between three different ports on Lake Ashi.
5-7) Three different levels of bus services to fill in the gaps among resorts and destinations. Most services are local, but others include a long-distance bus to get you back to Tokyo in a one-seat ride.

First, I need to clear up that despite the name, it's not "free".  It actually costs about $39-$44 per adult for a two day or three day pass, if you don't need transportation to Odawara (sort of the gateway to this resort area). Children are less expensive ($10-$14). Still, for a family of four you've got much less than the cost of a one day car rental (in Japan, at least). There are also many different options that can be added to the basic "Free Pass". These options include a special "romance train" from Shinjuku in Tokyo (basically a reserved seat, express train), and various hotel accommodation packages.

It's pretty clear that all this infrastructure (especially the rail lines) existed long before the current coordinated system was grouped and sold as packaged tourist transportation by the private railway group (The Odakyu Group). It certainly evolved over the decades, and probably wasn't built to the present configuration from a master transportation plan. Although I don't know the implementation history, I can tell it's a popular way to get around. Whoever came up with the idea to link all these services together succeeded - it works! People have numerous choices for getting from one spot to the other in the area - and you can do it while enjoying the great mountain scenery. Switching from one mode to another is kind of like going on a series of rides at Disneyland - although you get the sense that here the system actually works to move "real people" around too - not just tourists.

In summary - Hakone is a very popular mountainous tourist area with twisting, winding two-lane roads. If everyone that came there arrived via private automobile, the place would be a mess of parking lots, retaining walls, over-built roadways, traffic jams, and angry tourists. Instead, although it is still plenty crowded - the tourists can enjoy the area without the need to bring a car, and somehow the place seems just a bit better because of it.

Here are some of my photos from the various transit modes in Hakone:

The (New) End of the Road

If you want to ride on an expressway in Japan - you're going to get on a toll road - because ALL of the expressways carry tolls.  The toll roads were privatized in 2005 under a government reorganization of the Japan Public Highway system. In my part of Japan, the East Nippon Expressway Company, or NEXCO East, administers the toll road system. Unfortunately, almost all the information I've seen about NEXCO East is written in Japanese only.

Recently, our "local" toll road was lengthened to a new terminus near my house in Mabori Kaigan. In English, the road I'm referring to is called the "Yokohama - Yokosuka Toll Road", known to the local Americans as the "Yoko-Yoko". The road connects the southern part of Yokohama to Yokosuka - a distance of approximately 14.5 kilometers (9 miles). This road segment ties directly into the Shuto Expressway system of Yokohama / Tokyo - leading directly to both major cities. The new extension of the roadway, continues like a "beltway" around the central part of Yokosuka - to the new terminus at Mabori Kaigan - my neighborhood - a distance of about 2 miles.  In addition to the Yoko-Yoko's roll as a "connector" and beltway expressway, there is a short 2 mile spur from the Yokosuka Interchange, that leads directly to downtown Yokosuka.

The new section of roadway is mostly a two-lane road. It connects to the "Sahara" Interchange in Kinugasa - and includes three new exits along it's two miles of roadway: Kurihama, Uraga, and Mabori Kaigan. It includes a tunnel segment, a large portion in a boat section at the top of a mountain, and a very large portion on structure as it approaches the terminus. I have no idea how much this roadway cost - but it couldn't have been cheap!

Like all limited access roadways in Japan, the Yoko-Yoko is a toll road. The tolls in Japan are pretty steep -
they average about $1 per mile - depending on the exchange rate. It is less expensive if you have an Electronic Toll Collection reader in your car - but these are difficult for foreigners to acquire. My family of four has used the tollways to get to Tokyo for weekend getaways, and to travel to Tokyo Disney (actually located in Chiba prefecture) - but never for local travel within / or around Yokosuka / Yokohama.

To me it appears that the tolled expressway system of Japan is used primarily for trucking and long distance travel, but like my family's experience, not for many routine short trips. This is vastly different from how I used the interstate system when I lived in US cities as varied as San Diego, CA; Norfolk, VA; Orlando, FL; and Boston, MA.

A Train Rider's View of Yokohama Land Use

Here's a video out the window from the Keikyu train line as we traveled south through Yokohama toward Yokosuka ("outbound" and away from Tokyo). If you check out the Keikyu English website you'll read that the train line is pretty extensive - with a mainline that connects the Miura Peninsula, Yokosuka, Yokohama and Tokyo, a distance of about 35 miles. According to Wikipedia, the main line has over 40 stations, with a operating speed of 120 kilometers/hour (over 75 mph). Additionally, there are small spur lines connecting to various local destinations. This is just one of the many various routes that operate through the Kanto plain area of Japan.

The video depicts the land uses adjacent to the rail line as the train nears the Kamiooka station. Most of this section of the line is elevated, so it provides a good view of the adjacent neighborhoods. This footage is typical of the density evident in Yokohama and Yokosuka near the Keikyu line. Take particular notice of the extremely small building setbacks, mixed land uses (stores, small offices and housing units), and lack of surface parking.

Residential Parking in Japan

I'm a big fan of Donald Shoup's book, "The High Cost of Free Parking". If more planners and traffic engineers read his book, I think the world would be a better place! Don's book made me seriously think about parking in the US - but witnessing parking in a dense and crowded multimodal country like Japan sheds a whole new light on the issue, particularly residential parking.

One of the many steps required to register a vehicle in Japan is to prove that there is parking available for it off-street. I'm sure in some parts of the country it's OK to park a car on the street overnight - I just haven't yet seen it! To demonstrate the availability of parking, each residence has a certificate indicating the length, width, and height of the off-street parking spot. (I can't really call these "driveways" as we do in the US, because most of these spots are barely larger than the vehicle - and in fact, all Japanese cars' side-view mirrors either fold in automatically or manually to provide a few extra centimeters from an adjacent wall or column). The local police station verifies the parking spot dimensions, receives a small fee, and issues you a sticker to continue the registration process with the Japanese equivalent of the DMV. In my case, I didn't actually see a policeman come to my house and confirm the measurement - but I had to wait three days before I went back to pick up the sticker.

In spite of this rather bureaucratic process, car ownership is pretty high in Japan (In 2000 there were 651 cars per 1,000 persons in Japan; compared to 771 cars per 1,000 persons in the US, according to Don's book).

The slideshow below illustrates various off-street parking accommodations in my neighborhood in Yokosuka. I'll try to add more as I see them and photograph them. From the pictures, you can see that some people forego owning a car, while others do what is necessary to accommodate more than one car.