As one of the world’s biggest and most advanced cities, Tokyo needs to find a way to keep expanding.
But as it runs out of land, a new project hopes to reclaim land from its waters – and build a futuristic extension of the city in its bay.
The Tokyo Bay eSG Project is the brainchild of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government and aims to be a sustainable city built along the bay’s front and land that’s been reclaimed from the water.
The governor of Tokyo first announced it in April 2021. The project aims to counteract the destruction caused in the country by COVID-19. Architecture publication Rethinking the Future explains more in its analysis of the project.
It said: “The project will reclaim the old title of the world’s most advanced city. Hence, it stimulates the creation of a monopoly of innovation, technology, investments, and sustainability in the world market.”
Manabu Miyasaka, a deputy governor for Japan’s capital, explained more.
“Tokyo expanded through creating reclaimed land into the sea, and that is a strong advantage for us,” he said, Bloomberg reports.
Miyasaka added that “no one lives on the land we plan to use, so we can start from zero” rather than disrupting people’s daily lives.
The plans are to extend an unused parcel of land in the middle of the bay to 1,000 hectares (2,470 acres), with about one-fifth of the development completed.
The unpopulated area once hosted canoe and rowing competitions during the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, but it is now used for storing containers and processing garbage.
Miyasaka and his team want to focus on new technologies, such as reducing traffic congestion and greenhouse emissions and generating clean energy. The drive toward its green goals is already very much underway.
In September, the Tokyu Land Corporation announced its participation in the project’s sustainable future.
In a press release, it said: “Tokyu Land Corporation and SolarDuck BV, in collaboration with Kyocera Communication Systems Corporation, have completed the installation of Japan’s first offshore floating solar photovoltaic (OFPV) power plant on the sea surface under the Tokyo Bay eSG Project, an initiative of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government’s Policy Planning Bureau.
“This project is a demonstration project by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government that aims to realise the world’s most advanced energy generation and transmission from the Tokyo Bay Area.”
