Planning shaped by history and nature

The Greater Tokyo area is the largest metropolitan area in the world with nearly 37 million people. The public transport system in Tokyo is dominated by an extensive network of clean and efficient trains and subways that are both public and private and are run by a variety of operators. In Tokyo, rail is the primary mode of transportation and Tokyo has the most extensive urban railway network in the world. Tokyo’s largest railway network JR East runs most of the Shinkansen lines to cities around Japan and multiple lines such as the Yamanote Line, which is a loop that circles the centre of downtown of Tokyo. In Tokyo, the Shinjuku train station accommodates approximately 3 million people daily, as the station is home to financial district of Tokyo. 

The architecture in Tokyo, has been shaped by Tokyo’s long history in particular, the earthquakes that continue to hit Japan and the bombing in World War II. This has caused Tokyo’s urban landscape to contain many modern and contemporary architectural buildings as the older buildings are becoming scarcer as time goes on.

The tsunami that occurred on March 11 2011 was a severely devastating tsunami that killed many men, women and children. The tsunami was commonly referred to as the Great East Japan Earthquake. The tsunami caused thousands of people to relocate to temporary housing and victims of the tsunami are still located in the temporary housing almost 4 years after the devastation. Since then, the people of Sendai and surrounding areas have made buffer zones where there cannot be anymore development that is too close to the coast line. The millennium hill and the other memorial sites around Sendai, allow tourists and citizens of the area, to remember the victims of the tsunami and a lot of the sites are areas that have been affected are being kept left vacant to show the sheer size of the tsunami.

Steven Oscari