Tokyo Teleport Town Between Utopia and Reality free essay sample

Nevertheless, the urban growth enhanced by these transformations posed soon many problems – among the most important the land shortage for industrial and residential use. Therefore, since the 1960s, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government (TMG) started to develop different urban projects, which were supposed to bring an efficient solution to the land shortage as well as to contribute to the decentralization of the Tokyo Metropolis. The ultimate objective of TMGs urban projects was to promote the transition to a balanced and characteristic multi-core urban structure2. According to the Second and Third Long-Term urban plan (1986 and 1990), the development of 7 sub-centers (respectively Ikebukuro, Shinjuku, Shibuya, Osaki, UenoAsakusa, Kinshicho-Kameido and Waterfront Sub-center Teleport Town) was to be promoted. Whereas the 6 former sub-centers were already highly developed, the Tokyo Teleport Town (nicknamed T3), was the imagined catalyst for the multicore urban structure adaptive to the demands of the future3. Thus, the T3 was to become an ideal self-sufficient city, harmonically combining residential, economic, cultural and leisure centers. We will write a custom essay sample on Tokyo Teleport Town: Between Utopia and Reality or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Because of the highly ambitious and controversial nature of the T3 project, the objective of this paper will be to examine the extent to which this urban and scientific utopia of an ideal city became a reality. As it will be demonstrated through the analysis of the characteristic features of this utopist project (1) and of the impact of the burst of the bubble economy to its construction (2), the Tokyo Teleport Town represents nowadays rather a touristic attraction than an ideal city, similar to the other sub-centers of Tokyo. ) The utopist project of Tokyo Teleport Town After the success of Expo 85 in Tsukuba, dealing with the theme Science and Technology for Man at Home and having attracted over 20 million visitors from 111 countries, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government wanted to enhance the international success of the Tokyo Metropolis. Therefore, in the early 1990s, the Tokyo governor Shunichi Suzuki initiated an ambitious waterfront development project having for objective to rais e the Tokyo Teleport Town on the artificial island of Odaiba as a showcase of futuristic living. The whole project was supposed to be completed in 1996 in order to host the international urban exposition World City Expo Tokyo 96 also called Tokyo Frontier. According to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, The Tokyo Teleport Town project is preparing Tokyo to become a 21st century international metropolis for the futures advanced information oriented society [ ] Plans call for it to be a highly futuristic city with advanced telecommunications technology that will provide outstanding links to business centers around the globe 4 Thus, the T3 was supposed to be more than a showcase project destined for an International Exposition. It was supposed to become a self-sufficient city harmonically combining commercial, residential and cultural centers hosting approximately 60 000 residents and working population overlapping 100 000. According to the plans, when finished, this new city was expected to be oneand- a half times the size of the Shinjuku district. Moreover, the T3 was planned to function as Japan’s main international communication gateway, providing the Japanese metropolis with high 1 KUNIKO, Fujita. A World City and Flexible Specialization: Restructuring of the Tokyo Metropolis, in Internaitonal Journal of Urban and Regional Research, volume 15, Issue 2. , June 1991 2 Tokyo Metropolitan Governments statement, 1994, p. 46 3 4 GOTZE, John. Participatry Design in an Urban Context, PhD-thesis URL: http://gotze. dk/phd/index. html Quote from TTC Homepage, September 1995 Page 2 Tokyo Teleport Town: between utopia and reality Simona Kalikova quality office spaces as well as many other centers for economic, financial, academic and cultural international exchanges. As the name of Teleport Town reveals, the insular city was supposed to be well connected with the rest of Tokyo which would allow it to become a real dynamic sub-center of the Metropolis. Nevertheless, those plans were made in times when the Japanese bubble economy still had a healthy appearance and attracted many foreign investors. Unfortunately, the burst of the economic bubble in the early 90s had a fatal impact to the realization of the ideal city. ) The burst of the bubble economy and its impact on the development of T3 The Japanese bubble economy based on real estate speculation burst in 1991. This collapse caused a general stagnation of the commercial and urban development in Tokyo, but its impact was most severe on large, costly construction projects as the Tokyo Teleport Town. The burst of the Japanese price bubble caused bankrupt of many of the special private companies set up to develop the island and therefore, by 1995, Odaiba was a virtual wasteland, under populated and full of vacant and unfinished constructions. Because of the public dissatisfaction with the project as well as the inconvenient location of Odaiba (the Teleport city was not able to meet its objectives, as its connection to Tokyo – the Rainbow Bridge and the Yurikamome rapid transit line- were seen as time-consuming and thus did not encourage a proper delocalization of business activities), the Suzukis successor – Aoshima Yukiohalted the plan in 1995 and canceled the World City Expo Tokyo 96. By this time, over 1 trillion Japanese yen had been spent on the project. After the end of the lost decade and the progressive economic recovery, the development of Odaiba slowly continued on project to project basis and in the late 1990s, the area started to come back to life as a tourist and leisure zone. Several attractions such as the Palette Town, Miraikan (Japans National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation) or the Daikanransha (115-meters high Ferris-Wheel) were progressively constructed on the island as well as many shopping malls and leisure-activity centers. Moreover, some large companies, as for example the Fuji Television, relocated their headquarters to Odaiba, developing thus not only to the touristic, but also economic attractiveness of the island. This joint development of the artificial island contributed to the fact that in the late 2000s, Odaiba was ranked 12th among 70 most interesting places to visit in Tokyo by the Japan-guide. com. Conclusion Despite the ambitious plans, the burst of the economic bubble in the early 1990s caused that the utopist urban project of Tokyo Teleport Town did not become an ideal city for multifunctional human activity, but rather a touristic attraction. Even if many Tokyo residents as well as tourists coming from many foreign countries enjoy the visit of Odaiba, the island is more a place of transit than a place of living. Thus, Odaiba remains a place where many untouched areas are still waiting to be developed and many buildings are waiting to be constructed and populated. Word count: 1150) 5 http ://www. japan-guide. com/e/e3008. html Page 3 Tokyo Teleport Town: between utopia and reality Simona Kalikova Bibliography: ? ? ? ? PERNICE, Raffaelle. The Issue of Tokyo Bay’s Reclaimed Lands as the Origin of Urban Utopias in Modern Japanese Architecture, in AIJ Journal of Architecture and Planning, N. 267, March 2007, pp. 259-266 SHIOZAKI, Yoshimitsu. Residential Environment of Housing Estates on Artificial Islands, in: AIJ Journal of Architectural Planning and Engineering, No. 72, June 1995 KUNIKO, Fujita. A World City and Flexible Specialization: Restructuring of the Tokyo Metropolis, in International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, volume 15, Issue 2. , June 1991 CYBRIWSKY, Roman. Historical Dictionary of Tokyo, in Historical Dictionaries of Cities of the World, Scarecrow Press (United States), 1996 Sitography: ? PERNICE, Raffaelle. Modern Japanese Waterfront Developments Global vs. Local, IV Ajman Urban Planning Conference, 29th-31st March 2010, Ajman, United Arab Emirates, 2010 URL: http://www. cademia. edu/1554508/Modern_Japanese_Waterfront_Developments_-_Global_vs. _Local GOTZE, John. Participatory Design in an Urban Context, PhD-thesis URL: http://gotze. dk/phd/index. html BRESNAHAN, Jennifer. Teleports – Well-connected in Tokyo, in CIO, April 1 1996 URL : http://books. google. co. jp/books? id=iwcAAAAAMBAJpg=PA20lpg=PA20dq=tokyo+telepo rt+town+construction+problemssource=blots=PKshwCfeYOsig=zKD75mNsiymxfL_OENrsh6Jeshl=cssa=Xei=ZzsYUaz9BYqGlAWK0YGYCAredir_esc=y#v=onepageqf=false ? ? Page 4