Tokyo in 1973

Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2020/09/23/tokyo-in-1973.html

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It’s mind-blowing to realize that is what Tokyo looked like only 28 years after looking like this:

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I don’t recognize any of these cars, or buildings, or signs or. . .wait a second, was that a Dairy Queen?

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Did you spot the McDonald’s?

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No! Timestamp?

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You would think they would have taken the time during the rebuilding effort to lay the city out in a more organized grid pattern where possible. But that never happened. Instead the city expanded by incorporating smaller towns in the vicinity. Giving it a more haphazard layout.

I go there every 2 years or so since 2003 and I will never be able to navigate my way around it except by subway or heavy reliance on a phone GPS.

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0:42.

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Destroyed cities are rarely redesigned. The only case I know of is Rotterdam. (Paris of course needs to be unique: They did it without disaster under Napoleon III.)

In fact, even in the world’s oldest cities you can still see ancient streets, rivers, the outlines of defences as walls, gatehouses etc… because city plans don’t change.

It is after all very difficult to change because even when buildings are destroyed the old boundaries and property lines are still there. A government needs a lot of support from their population (or being a total tyranny) to disown and or redistribute that much land in one go.

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Entire cities may not necessarily be redesigned but it usually affects them on a small scale. Destruction has a habit of re-purposing neighborhoods and making them more amenable to modernization. Some areas lose their original function with new buildings in the area. Modernization becomes easier because you aren’t retrofitting or replacing an existing system or infrastructure but have to create new ones there.

Paris and Kyoto generally only have modern buildings in its outskirts as the cities expanded. London, Berlin, Tokyo, Osaka are littered with them.

Even New York City underwent a major change/redesign after 9/11. The Financial district became a partly residential neighborhood for the first time in over a century.

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Oh, the buildings, styles, and use may change. But the city plans don’t. You mention London: Even after the great fire of 1666 all the old roads and boundaries were kept. There were plans for a more sensible street plan (ie. anything else) but that never happened. Because of the complexities of landownership.

In many old Old World cities you can still navigate the inner city with a 13th century map.

So what Tokyo did after the destruction is not that unusual, it is done that way everywhere.

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