Driving in Japan

[Maciamo]

Did you realise that there were no round-abouts in Japan (at least, I have never seen any) ?

There are also very few tunnels inside Tokyo, compared to older cities like Paris or Brussels, where you spend more time in tunnels than outside if you decide to take a turn on the ring road. Streets are too narrow to cope with the high affluence. Tokyo has been kind of blessed to have the opportunity to redesign its street plan after the WWII ground destruction (I know, it's a double-edge compliment as it also lost most of its historical heritage, but earthquakes have helped before anyway).

As a consequence, bottlenecks are scarce, even during the peaks, also thanks to the effecient synchornisation of traffic lights. The idea is to canalise the traffic on the large straight 6-lane arteries or on high-speed elevated motorways, whilst secondary streets are left as empty and narrow backstreets (what make them for convenient for bicycles and pedestrians).

The city's roads are built in the sky. The kousokudouro (expressway) fly above your head and cast their shadows on the surrounding concrete buildings. In this respect, Tokyo shares a lot with other Asian capitals like Bangkok or Seoul - which have been quick to catch up with their Japanese counterpart.

I was also quite surprised by the absence of squares in Japanese cities. Every Western city has its famous gathering place : Trafalgar square or Leicester Square in London, Time Square in NY, all the "places" in Paris (Vendome, Opera, Bastille...), Alexander or Potzdamer Platz in Berlin, the inumerable plaza in every Italian city... Most European cities have a City Hall square, several "market square" (even if cafes have taken over the market) and maybe some other as well. You'll usually find a Plaza Mayor in Spain, a Groote Markt in the Netherlands and Flanders, a Rathaus Platz in Germany...
30-million-people Tokyo has very little "wasted space". I can hardly think of even a minor square (広場 hiroba). There is a kind of little one around a fountain in front of Shimbashi Station and the overcrowded Hachiko meeting point in Shibuya, but they are wouldn't even qualify as a square in a minor European town.

What we learn from this here is that Japanese people prefer sacrificing architectural beauty and traditional meeting squares (where disgruntled populace can also gather to demonstrate) to the efficency of elevated highway in the middle of glamorous department stores and historical temples and making sure that every bit of space is used profitably (as land cost so much there).

[thomas]

@ expressways

Architecture-wise a horrible thing. I've been to Bangkok, uhm, 11 years ago, there wasn't a single expressway to be found. I've seen recent pictures of Bangkok and was shocked: the city has turned into a maze of steel and concrete.

@ wasted space

I was impressed by these multistoried parking lots in Tokyo and elsewhere. Below there's a small example, they are usually larger.

[moyashi]

@ parking
I've seen some really nice elevator type parking lots. Defintely something Japan excels at.

@ streets
hehe, somebody forgot to mention the 20-30km long traffic jams on the raised high ways during the U-turn return home traffic right before public holidays finish, the young kids who drive the circuit in Tokyo up to 250+ km/hour speeds at night, the drunk bus drivers who average 150 km/hr and what not.

True though, in general I think that Japan has been lucky with some of it's street work.

Unlike Tokyo, Sapporo was layed out in Western fashion from the start.

@ road construction
Currently with the economic downturn many planned highways are looking at being cut.

The construction of many roads are built in a soft manner so that every few years they need to be resurfaced due to the weight of trucks.

@ topic
This is one topic I've avoided since I complain about the condition in Sapporo all the time. Sapporo drivers are very different than those south who apparently have better manners.

[tosh]

I've seen those elevator type car-parks in Manhattan.

[Maciamo]

Unlike Tokyo, Sapporo was layed out in Western fashion from the start.

What do you mean ? I thought that Sapporo had a similar lay out to Kyoto, which took it from Ancient Chinese Chang'an (Xi'an). You'll never see such perpendicular vertical and horizontal streets anywhere in Europe. I guess you thought about American cities. The question is who copied whom ? As the US have much newer cities than Europe and Asia, it wouldn't be wrong to say that American have followed the traditional Chinese grid pattern lay out rather than the Western (i.e. European) one.

[moyashi]

- Sapporo was layed out by Clark and his staff. Somebody took out a ruler and laid a grid to the map. Any streets that are confusing were later added by Japanese and their interesting techinique of road divination that must be a bad shinto joke.
- Sapporo was chosen over Mururan as the capital of Hokkaido by Clark. Clark was American.

Many Japaneses say that Sapporo Copies Kyoto but the only thing that is similar is the main road that leads straight from Sapporo Station and possibly the street naming conventions that are somewhat similar.

The Chinese layout (I'm basing on Kyoto's layout hoping that they stuck close to the Chinese system) is not really perpendicular as such.

The main castle sits at the top of the pyramid like layout. With one central street running straight from the main gates out of town. The perpendicular feel is from each "JO" that is horizontal starting in front of the main gates. No roads are, ahem, used behind the castle.

Sapporo was layout by Americans so ... I guess Americans copied Americans.
Kyoto, I agree copied China (I didn't know the city though).

Sapporo is layout based on Odori park which is the true center of town, which runs from West 1 to West 12. North 1 starts north of Odori Park and south the same. East and West are split by Sose River (lolo ... more like stream) which was a canal actually. Anything from East 1 to East ? and South 13 (errr Toyohira River) to ??? were at one time Red Light Districts or Farming areas.

Tokyo's layout I have clue. But I bet the crazy shinto gods had a blast and blessed those who live in the city with various noches and crannies ;)

[nebosuke]

Here's a couple shots of the entrance to a parking structure. These had two towers, so you parked on a turnstile and they spun your car to whichever they wanted to load your vehicle into, so even the entryway was space efficient. I saw some that were exposed, instead of having walls, but it was in passing so didn't get any photos.