Changes in Japan
Physical
In past postings I have mentioned that over the last decade or more I have witnessed a large number of distribution centers built just outside Tokyo and a little further away. When I first heard of the 15 minute cities, I took this as, possibly, preparation for this change. There are other commercial interests that have ballooned in the past few years that lend credence to the belief that TPTB are funneling us all into their idea what is necessary, 15 minute cities.
Contemporary in my observations to the seeming sudden appearance of massive distribution centers is disappearing gas stations. Rural Japan is littered with derelict service stations. True, it was obvious that many were abandoned years ago, but more were more recently shutdown. Following my Dad’s teachings, I always gas up the car the night before setting out on a trip. This habit has served me well several times as the gas gauge neared “E” on the return leg before a station that was still in operation could be found more than once. On more than one occasion, stations that we had used in the past had gone out of business since I last time in the area. Recently, the local station I went to exclusively for more than 15 years suddenly closed. It stood along side the ole’ Kaido and has since been replaced with a photo studio. It is not the only one along this major thoroughfare in my city of half a million to close in recent years.
This came up in an online discussion on an excellent website confronting anthropological global warming nonsense as the result of Green agenda policies; Japan wants to reign in the use of privately owned vehicles. I countered that I believed it was more due to new safety regulations that were not grandfathered in that older, low volume stations could not afford to comply with, forcing them out of business. That is true, however I now suspect that the reason for these regs was to force them to close.
In the opposite direction, there has been an explosion in the number of both drug stores and fitness centers everywhere I frequent. IIRC, the increase began just prior to the panic and has skyrocketed just as covid also took off. Some are even open 24 hours a day, hours rare for most businesses in Japan, including gas stations (excluding at least some in highway service areas). I am not even sure that Denny’s is opened 24 hours in Japan, but we now have 24hr drug stores and 24hr fitness centers. Off the top of my head I can place three fitness centers in a small area of my town that opened after the panic struck. There are many more all over Tokyo. Akihabara has at least three new, large drug stores, one of which is a 24hr. My area of town has four new dug stores, all opened less than ten years ago, at least two during the panic.
Over the last 15 or so years, I have observed undeniably large increases in the numbers of distribution centers just outside Tokyo, drug stores and fitness centers everywhere while gas stations and retail stores are disappearing. Does this prove that Japan is actually moving to the 15 minute city model? No. However, these are changes that would have to be made if they were doing so.
There’s always plausible deniability in all of this along with natural change and evolution of the way people live. Physical shops are becoming a thing a the past all over the world and it can be seen clearly here in Hong Kong. One reason is that people just buy everything they need cheaply and conveniently from platforms like Taobao and even though I also lament the loss of the old way of life, the simple fact is that I can get the same things far more cheaply online and those people running the retail businesses for all those years previously made small fortunes and charged as much as they could get away with for all those years before there was an alternative. Food is also cheaper and better with far better service over the border in mainland China and what remains in Hong Kong are endless restaurant chains, selling overpriced, bland, pre-prepared foods are more often than not, also pre-prepared in China and shipped to HK.
Fitness centres have been here for much longer and seem to go through boom and bust cycles but they are certainly in a boom phase right now. For me I cannot understand why anyone would pay to go and workout in an air conditioned room of stale air doing repetitive movements on half a dozen machines when the outdoors is well within reach of the majority of people. spite HK being one of the densest places on earth, around 40% of the landmass is countryside and greenery and even in the heart of the city you can find large parks or climb up into the nearby hillside and rise above it all.
It is also likely the plan for 15 minute cities is being actively pursued by a relatively small number of people and as you go down the pyramid of command it becomes less of a clear objective and it’s more about profiting from endless development with even further down the scale offers employment opportunities. At the bottom of the scale are those who are so brainless as to actually welcome 15 minute cities as they cannot see beyond their virtual reality dominated lives - why would anyone want to be away from their screens any longer than necessary? Even my neighbours, who moved away from the urban area to our village due to affordable housing, gush about a future where the metro line will extend to the periphery of our village and bring all the “wonderful” convenience that associated development in the area this will bring. My only hope is that property prices will rise sufficiently that I will be able to sell up and have money to start again by moving to a more remote place in the hope that it will not suffer the same fate in my lifetime.
What is the website you referred to?