> It's a concept that's difficult to replicate elsewhere, but Lydon compares it to what made old Main Street America so special. Designing at a people-first scale pays off. "The smell of fried croquettes drifting onto the streets, small shops run by the building owners, easy public transit access, a feeling of safety and community for all ages… it's hard to overstate how well this all works."
Honestly, even though I love the idea of Japan and the idealized vision of Japan that's often presented in the media, I can't help thinking that a lot of this stuff can be found much closer to home in Europe. The BBC didn't need to go all the way to Tokyo - they could find this in pretty much any Spanish city.
Or come to downtown Vancouver. I live in a small apartment, but within four blocks I have a community centre with gym, a pharmacy, a post office, a grocery store, a small bakery, the best liquor store in the city, three banks, a hot pot restaurant, a physiotherapist/massage therapist office, a vet, a dispensary, multiple hairdressers, an optometrist, several restaurants, two places to get gelato, a public plaza with a weekly farmer's market, a walking/cycling route along the waterfront, a car wash, a sports bar with arcade machines, skeeball, and pinball, an enclosed pollinator meadow, a science museum/IMAX theatre, two separate public "subway" lines (though one is elevated and one is below-grade), and two private but inexpensive water taxi services.
I can leave my house at 6 AM and go get fresh bread or baked goods and go sit by the water, or I can leave the house at 7 AM to get groceries if I'm out of something and be back by 7:10.
American cities don't want this because having a huge empty house with a huge empty yard and having to drive 90 minutes to get to work or 30 minutes to get groceries is the American Dream and no one who's been sold this dream wants to believe that there are so many better and more efficient ways to live.
It's because living in downtown Vancouver is expensive. Your rent probably comes close to covering the mortgage on one of those huge empty houses in the suburbs. That fresh baked good is probably ~$4 while the equivalent at Walmart is $1. No doubt it's a great lifestyle for well off DINKs. A lot harder to make it work for a family of 5 on 50k a year.
While you are correct about Vancouver downtown, once you get o suburbs like Langley, Coquitlam, they are no different that what you are calling out American cities for.
If we limit this to downtowns, there are several cities in America that are similar (Boston, Seattle, SF, SanDiego, Austin, NYC to name a few).
Plenty of American cities have this. I have three big grocery stores within a 2-7 minute walk. Myriad restaurants, bakeries, and cafes literally on the same block and within walking distance of me.
Vancouver is great, just wanted to call out the bias and massive overgeneralization in your statement.
I have a nature area, gym, pharmacy, grocery store, numerous restaurants, bar, and a bunch of other amenities you just listed. I live basically on the rail line so I can get to the rest of the city in 30 minutes (with more of said amenities) and am at the intersection of two major highways which means I have even more travel options. I'm 2 train stops from a smaller downtown which has every botique shop you can imagine.
I do live in a place that was specifically designed for this but these places are designed and aren't that unheard of in US cities. When I lived in the suburbs I had similar options a few minutes walk from my house.
One key difference that jumps out at me between various cities in Japan and Vancouver is that the COL seems significantly better in Japan. When I visited Vancouver I couldn't afford to stay in or even near the city, I had to find a place about 20 minutes away and even then it was pricey. Whereas in Japan I had no problem finding affordable stays in city centers in all of the major cities I visited, including Tokyo.
I will admit my ignorance here however and acknowledge there are likely myriad other variables at play here that I'm not considering.
Canada wins either way. You can notice this on reddit discussions too - they are absolutely upset about the orange king. And that motivates Canadians to do better than Americans now - after all you don't want the orange king to be able to ruin Canada here.
The single most frustrating thing about being in Canada is they can't even work out how to use their current grievances to deal with, you know, getting out of our own way like the crazy inter provincial trade restrictions. And yet the complex remains.
One of the insane aspects of this is it's genuinely easier to deal with foreign countries than other parts of the same country . . . but I digress.
Canadians are doing an adequate job of ruining Canada without external help.
They're worried about the "orange king" but put the actual queen/king on their money. Still getting cornholed by England after all these years. Hilarious.
I live in an American city. I have a yard large enough to play frisbee with my dog. I walk downstairs to go to work. I can walk to a good taqueria and take pole dancing classes a few doors up (someday). There is an evil bank that I could walk to but don't. Cafe, Thai, Soul Food, Vietnamese, Pizza. Closer than all of the walking distance I mentioned is light rail that goes downtown and further. Someday it might even go to Vancouver (the other one sadly :( )
TFA explains that Japan is unusual as being the only country in Asia with two cities in the top 10 most liveable cities in the World. That's why they wrote the article. If Spain had been the only country in Europe with two cities in the top 10, they might have done it in Spain.
And outside of a handful of New England towns, wherever that kind of city planning exists in the US, those parts of town are inhabited by half-dead zombies on meth whispering threats at you as you walk by. Not a pleasant experience. That's why sane people in the US usually move to suburbia as soon as they can afford a car.
> smell of fried croquettes drifting onto the streets, small shops run by the building owners, easy public transit access
The genius of the BBC is to gloss over that in a culture that isn't Japanese these things all easily become negatives.
Who wants the smell of other people's food, maybe from a cuisine you hate? Or new local businesses cannot start because they can't buy property limiting options for consumers? And public transit stops become noise and litter parties.
All of your complaints sound like someone who is projecting American values and behavior onto another culture.
> Or new local businesses cannot start because they can't buy property limiting options for consumers?
Are a lot of new local businesses starting up in America's suburbs? Is it a problem to have the same shops operating in the community for decades if they serve the community's needs?
Even in Manhattan I saw 'shops' which seemed to have a similar square footage to my bathtub; if there's an opportunity people will find a way.
> And public transit stops become noise and litter parties.
If you have garbage cans at your transit stops and your populace are respectful towards each other then this is also not a problem. If your idea of a transit stop is somehow also some kind of rowdy social event then the problem is not urban planning.
Fundamentally though this is a common American attitude. Look at something that's new and different and say "This would be bad for these reasons", ignoring the fact that dozens of other Western and Eastern countries with dozens of different cultures and behaviors all do these things and it all works out fine.
It's the same as the argument about health care. Socialized medicine would be bad for reasons X, Y, Z, even though if you look at countries which have socialized medicine and a similar standard of living you'll see that not only do those countries not have those problems but also those countries have better health outcomes, longer life expectancy, and more efficient healthcare.
You say that none of this stuff would work in "a culture that isn't Japanese", but what you really mean is that it wouldn't work "in a culture which is American", so maybe that's a good place to start looking for things to change.
Exactly what I was thinking. In Europe (e.g. UK or Germany) people often complain when chip shops or other fried food establishments open below them, because of the constant smells.
I wonder how much of these architecture, building etc decisions are because of higher percentage of aging population. In the west, we see more anti-homeless designs (spikes, removing benches in train stations etc) which is sad
I had to laugh when they put a quote from a wheelchair user at the top of the article. Japan is many good things, but friendly to wheelchair users is not one of them.
As western tourists always seem to find out when they land with their gigantic suitcases, many Tokyo train stations require stairs to enter or exit.
on tokyo train and subway stations specifically: maybe in the past they weren't accessible, but at least since the olympics, they've become so. i believe they're closing in on 100% now.
Not even close. They're better than they used to be, and the major stations that tourists go to are mostly kinda-sorta OK, but the median station has 1 elevator if you're lucky, and probably around the same number of accessible entrances.
...and we haven't even discussed the fact that riding the train with a wheelchair typically involves reservation of a staff member on each end of the journey, to help you get on and off.
> I'd be interested learning how you've come up with that - it's disinformation. i'm speaking from extensive, direct experience.
I live here and have eyes. But tell me more about "disinformation."
Tokyo metro's standard for accessibility is to have one route that is accessible from street level to the platform. That's fine, but it's a far cry from every entrance being accessible, or even just ensuring that you don't require staff support to make it through that route. Consider Takadanobaba [1] -- a major transit point that I know well. Yes, it's technically "one route", but just taking into account subway station exits (and not Seibu or JR line transfers, which are harder), it qualifies only because it has a single elevator that goes to ground. Literally every other exit is inaccessible.
i use the subway here nearly everyday - many different routes, not just touristy areas, often to small stations on the outskirts of the city, or other places i haven't been, just for fun. i don't think i've ever seen a station with only one elevator, it's always at least one platform-to-ticket-gate, and one ticket-gate-to-ground (maybe that's what you meant). the worst i've experienced has been a wheelchair-accessible stair lift or escalator (a bit dreadful, but they do work). if you want to do some random sampling, pull up a random station map and check the accessible routes.
> I don't think i've ever seen a station with only one elevator, it's always at least one platform-to-ticket-gate, and one ticket-gate-to-ground (maybe that's what you meant).
Well, first, I'm talking not just about the subway, but all rail lines, which is a higher bar.
Setting that aside, what I meant was what you've inferred -- there's typically one elevator path that will get you out of an "accessible" station. Yes, that (usually) requires one elevator per platform to work at all, but it still leaves most exits inaccessible in the average case.
I started this subthread only by saying that Tokyo is not particularly wheelchair friendly. If you use one, I don't know how you could possibly dispute this. It's a land of staircases, and I've been repeatedly foiled just trying to move heavy luggage.
I grant you that in Japan they will usually bend over backwards to make something work, but I really feel for disabled folks here.
yeah, that's mostly correct, but i don't see it as a barrier. i don't think an elevator needs to be slammed down next to every staircase. if there's a way in, and a way out, i consider that a win. will i lose maybe 5 minutes because the accessible entrance is not in the most convenient location that day? perhaps. but it's just that - an inconvenience.
on the staff support: i don't really see any problem here at all. in fact, i think the service that the staff provides is truly excellent. most lines have nearly level train-to-platform gaps, but if i feel like i need a ramp, i can ask the attendant at the gate, and they will arrange for someone to quickly unfold a portable ramp when the train arrives, and for someone to do the same at the destination, exactly where i arrive. (coming from the US, can i imagine this level of service at any US city? uh, yeah, no.)
> if there's a way in, and a way out, i consider that a win. will i lose maybe 5 minutes because the accessible entrance is not in the most convenient location that day? perhaps. but it's just that - an inconvenience.
I get that, and I also don't think they need to plop an elevator at every staircase, but there are so many stations where they could have ramps or some other minor improvement to make more exits accessible. And if the one path drops you on the wrong side of the tracks from your destination, that's often more than a five-minute problem.
> on the staff support: i don't really see any problem here at all. in fact, i think the service that the staff provides is truly excellent.
I agree. I just made a similar comment on your other response. Compared to many places in the world, they're at least trying.
If you read through the description, what they talk about is that the culture is built around the idea of the individual being part of something bigger, and that consideration and respect for that something bigger (other people), is core to your own identity.
That's not hard for a lot of cultures, but it's almost impossible for most cultures in the Western hemisphere, and to change it would require a cultural reset that would run against the grain of many things that make those cultures what they are.
If it were possible though - and there are times when certain subcultures had standards of etiquette different to those widely accepted today in the West - it wouldn't need 100% of people to "sign up", just enough to make it ostracising to not conform. And then the outliers would conform.
We do this already: it's OK (albeit illegal), to cycle through a red light where I live, because lots of people do it, but if you were to try and get served ahead of your turn in a pub, you might get into an argument, because nobody does that without expecting a problem.
The cracks are already there though in Japan where this is starting to fall apart and has fueled a substantial rise in anti-immigration sentiment there. Particularly at specific groups that are not assimilating (but affecting basically every immigrant).
I feel like half your post is dancing around not saying this.
I'm not saying this, because I'm not aware of this. I have a friend who is enjoying living in Osaka, but I wouldn't feel qualified to talk about Japanese sentiment towards him or any other group of non-natives.
I'm saying that culture spreads through fear of being ostracized and the cost of not conforming to that culture. This is true in any country. It seems Japan has a "broader" and "firmer" culture that is rooted in respect to others, but it would take some serious effort for a similar culture to take hold in Europe or the US, I think.
A sense of "non conformity" leading to issues is not unique to Japan though, in Europe it is described as a problem with "multiculturalism".
The British (of which I am one), have spent thousands of years stealing the best bits of immigrant culture but seem to have forgotten that (or have been unable to absorb, for whatever reason), for the last ~60 years. That's leading to a rise in far-right sentiment and a growing desire for mono-culturalism. I can see evidence of that in Germany, France and other European nations. I could easily imagine it appearing more in Japan.
This is the flip side of East Asian societies where everything is polite and orderly: they're also extremely conformist (sometimes stifling so), and the conformity and good manners are maintained by strict social policing (it's not much fun to stand out and be different)
What qualifies as good manners varies from situation to situation, but the concept of acting with good manners is hardly complicated (conform to the expected behavior of the situation).
Enforcment is a matter of encoding the rules and then applying a carrot and/or stick -- same as any other rule.
"Conform to the expected behavior of the situation" is incredibly complicated. What is the situation? How do you determine what the expected behavior is? What exactly does conforming consist of?
It takes humans years to learn how to do this. Entire books are written on the subject. A major medical disorder affecting millions of people includes a persistent difficulty doing this specific thing. Even normal people have to put serious effort into this if they visit a place where societal norms are different from what they're used to.
If it's not complicated, then I'm sure you can write down the rules for some specific situation real quick. Go ahead....
That's the key one -- it should be first and maybe the only one on the list. Japan is mono-culture and high-trust. They are all on the same page. You can't replicate that in western cities any more, such as the US or Europe. In some ways it's at odds with the idea of globalization and multiculturalism.
And with countries with lots of newcomers it can take decades (well, generations) to take on the host countries manners rather than sticking to home country manners that may not mesh with host country’s manners/customs.
I think they are saying that it's difficult to "maintain manners" for hundreds of thousands to millions of diverse "I, the individual" 's. It's great that you don't struggle with that yourself, but your manners can be made entirely irrelevant by 1 person in a public place who has anti-social behaviors (doesn't share the same set of "required" values for that society).
The actual question is if you could move to another country with a very different system of "manners" (read: culture) and throw out your learned behavior and adopt theirs.
My experience living in an incredibly multi-cultural immigrant dense area, is overwhelmingly "No". People like their "home" cultures (generally they believe its the best), and they tend to carry some degree of resentment for their new society for not recognizing that. It creates endless friction at the edges (whereas core values tend to be pretty similar globally).
Japan doesn't really deal with this at all, and what immigrant ingress they have is usually fueled by people trying to live a Japanese like life.
The BBC forgot - or, as is more likely, refused to mention - rule #0: ensure a homogeneous culture with rather stringent rules around public behaviour.
Probably because you need separation from the culture to fully evaluate and appreciate it. If they interviewed someone from Japan, that person would probably complain about how un-livable Japan has become. Like the subway trains are always full and they have to wait five minutes for the next one.
Cities and any polity or group of people cannot be created by some abstract rules or enforced. You need it to be composed of individuals who are disposed to act harmoniously with each other and have a culture (which is basically a bunch of jigging to aid harmonious interactions, you cannot create top down the manners you don't want people to violate). Everyone acting in their own self-interest ends up creating a harmonious organization because all of their self-interest corresponds such that their self interest is reflected in the good of the whole.
Just as a feedback system, if there is something wrong in a city or organization if the person who encounters it sees it as contrary to their own self interest and is capable of dealing with it themselves they will.
If this internal principle does not exist you rely on top down surveillance and enforcement which is basically delusional if it works will only be through violent enforcement against the people. Again in terms of a feedback system, if the polity is constructed out of a bunch of individuals who have a self-interest that corresponds with the good of the whole, there is no need to propagate that information to some manager. The persons directly involved with it are capable of dealing with it mindful of it's impact on the good of the whole because it's good for them. If you do not have that you would need a system of management, evaluation, and enforcement which basically demands the disruption in question is something easy to communicate and form policies around. Anything that cannot be just cannot be dealt with and the system falls under it's own weight. That's why technocracy is a delusion that is always doomed to fail, if the individual units in a system are unable to deal with aberrations on their own it requires the whole mass of bureaucracy to evaluate, construct policies, enforce etc. That is only capable of handling anything which is understandable to that kind of system, which is a small fraction of actual disruptions.
I appreciate the efforts of people trying to emulate the positives of Japanese cities mimicking the externals of it and enforcing it on other people is the opposite of any actual organic system and itself prohibits the more dynamic system that is required for an actually stable polity. If someone sees a wallet on the street they have to see it as their own self-interest not to steal it. If people do not see themselves as having a shared self-interest with those around them there is no enforcement or rules or policies that can make that polity stable or harmonious.
You can find similar articles by other media outlets. Japan has changed - and is changing. I've also noticed this on youtube, e. g. Paolo from Tokyo suddenly praising new restrictive laws. That was a strong indicator that Japan really fundamentally changed here. An old chinese stratagem is to hide the dagger behind the smile: https://www.echineselearning.com/blog/chinese-slang-hide-a-d...
I am not in any way applying that this applies to all japanese as such, of course; but I am more referring here to a trend where things are changing to the worse. Also, cost of living is high and there is an overcrowding problem in many of the cities. Even then I think the only city that would interest me is Tokio.
> It's a concept that's difficult to replicate elsewhere, but Lydon compares it to what made old Main Street America so special. Designing at a people-first scale pays off. "The smell of fried croquettes drifting onto the streets, small shops run by the building owners, easy public transit access, a feeling of safety and community for all ages… it's hard to overstate how well this all works."
Honestly, even though I love the idea of Japan and the idealized vision of Japan that's often presented in the media, I can't help thinking that a lot of this stuff can be found much closer to home in Europe. The BBC didn't need to go all the way to Tokyo - they could find this in pretty much any Spanish city.
Or come to downtown Vancouver. I live in a small apartment, but within four blocks I have a community centre with gym, a pharmacy, a post office, a grocery store, a small bakery, the best liquor store in the city, three banks, a hot pot restaurant, a physiotherapist/massage therapist office, a vet, a dispensary, multiple hairdressers, an optometrist, several restaurants, two places to get gelato, a public plaza with a weekly farmer's market, a walking/cycling route along the waterfront, a car wash, a sports bar with arcade machines, skeeball, and pinball, an enclosed pollinator meadow, a science museum/IMAX theatre, two separate public "subway" lines (though one is elevated and one is below-grade), and two private but inexpensive water taxi services.
I can leave my house at 6 AM and go get fresh bread or baked goods and go sit by the water, or I can leave the house at 7 AM to get groceries if I'm out of something and be back by 7:10.
American cities don't want this because having a huge empty house with a huge empty yard and having to drive 90 minutes to get to work or 30 minutes to get groceries is the American Dream and no one who's been sold this dream wants to believe that there are so many better and more efficient ways to live.
It's because living in downtown Vancouver is expensive. Your rent probably comes close to covering the mortgage on one of those huge empty houses in the suburbs. That fresh baked good is probably ~$4 while the equivalent at Walmart is $1. No doubt it's a great lifestyle for well off DINKs. A lot harder to make it work for a family of 5 on 50k a year.
While you are correct about Vancouver downtown, once you get o suburbs like Langley, Coquitlam, they are no different that what you are calling out American cities for.
If we limit this to downtowns, there are several cities in America that are similar (Boston, Seattle, SF, SanDiego, Austin, NYC to name a few).
I think OP must be in their early 20s and has not experienced much of life yet.
And there's nothing wrong with that.
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Plenty of American cities have this. I have three big grocery stores within a 2-7 minute walk. Myriad restaurants, bakeries, and cafes literally on the same block and within walking distance of me.
Vancouver is great, just wanted to call out the bias and massive overgeneralization in your statement.
I live in a US city.
I have a nature area, gym, pharmacy, grocery store, numerous restaurants, bar, and a bunch of other amenities you just listed. I live basically on the rail line so I can get to the rest of the city in 30 minutes (with more of said amenities) and am at the intersection of two major highways which means I have even more travel options. I'm 2 train stops from a smaller downtown which has every botique shop you can imagine.
I do live in a place that was specifically designed for this but these places are designed and aren't that unheard of in US cities. When I lived in the suburbs I had similar options a few minutes walk from my house.
One key difference that jumps out at me between various cities in Japan and Vancouver is that the COL seems significantly better in Japan. When I visited Vancouver I couldn't afford to stay in or even near the city, I had to find a place about 20 minutes away and even then it was pricey. Whereas in Japan I had no problem finding affordable stays in city centers in all of the major cities I visited, including Tokyo.
I will admit my ignorance here however and acknowledge there are likely myriad other variables at play here that I'm not considering.
> American cities don't want this
You convinced yourself Canada doesn't have suburbs or rural areas?
Have you ever left your province or even your four square blocks?
Canada is 98% rural by land area (though ~18% of the population lives there).
Canada basically IS the US with metric and the people talk funny.
America is too big to compare it with one single city of Canada.
Canada wins either way. You can notice this on reddit discussions too - they are absolutely upset about the orange king. And that motivates Canadians to do better than Americans now - after all you don't want the orange king to be able to ruin Canada here.
The single most frustrating thing about being in Canada is they can't even work out how to use their current grievances to deal with, you know, getting out of our own way like the crazy inter provincial trade restrictions. And yet the complex remains.
One of the insane aspects of this is it's genuinely easier to deal with foreign countries than other parts of the same country . . . but I digress.
Canadians are doing an adequate job of ruining Canada without external help.
They're worried about the "orange king" but put the actual queen/king on their money. Still getting cornholed by England after all these years. Hilarious.
I live in an American city. I have a yard large enough to play frisbee with my dog. I walk downstairs to go to work. I can walk to a good taqueria and take pole dancing classes a few doors up (someday). There is an evil bank that I could walk to but don't. Cafe, Thai, Soul Food, Vietnamese, Pizza. Closer than all of the walking distance I mentioned is light rail that goes downtown and further. Someday it might even go to Vancouver (the other one sadly :( )
TFA explains that Japan is unusual as being the only country in Asia with two cities in the top 10 most liveable cities in the World. That's why they wrote the article. If Spain had been the only country in Europe with two cities in the top 10, they might have done it in Spain.
But yeah, this description matches the city I live in here in France.
That kind of thing is extremely rare in the US sadly.
Nowadays. The last 50 years haven't been kind to people in the US.
I'd feel more sorry if they hadn't voted for it every two years for the last 50.
And outside of a handful of New England towns, wherever that kind of city planning exists in the US, those parts of town are inhabited by half-dead zombies on meth whispering threats at you as you walk by. Not a pleasant experience. That's why sane people in the US usually move to suburbia as soon as they can afford a car.
That's probably because the US said that meth addicts aren't allowed to exist indoors. So instead they exist outdoors. Who would've expected that?
> smell of fried croquettes drifting onto the streets, small shops run by the building owners, easy public transit access
The genius of the BBC is to gloss over that in a culture that isn't Japanese these things all easily become negatives.
Who wants the smell of other people's food, maybe from a cuisine you hate? Or new local businesses cannot start because they can't buy property limiting options for consumers? And public transit stops become noise and litter parties.
All of your complaints sound like someone who is projecting American values and behavior onto another culture.
> Or new local businesses cannot start because they can't buy property limiting options for consumers?
Are a lot of new local businesses starting up in America's suburbs? Is it a problem to have the same shops operating in the community for decades if they serve the community's needs?
Even in Manhattan I saw 'shops' which seemed to have a similar square footage to my bathtub; if there's an opportunity people will find a way.
> And public transit stops become noise and litter parties.
If you have garbage cans at your transit stops and your populace are respectful towards each other then this is also not a problem. If your idea of a transit stop is somehow also some kind of rowdy social event then the problem is not urban planning.
Fundamentally though this is a common American attitude. Look at something that's new and different and say "This would be bad for these reasons", ignoring the fact that dozens of other Western and Eastern countries with dozens of different cultures and behaviors all do these things and it all works out fine.
It's the same as the argument about health care. Socialized medicine would be bad for reasons X, Y, Z, even though if you look at countries which have socialized medicine and a similar standard of living you'll see that not only do those countries not have those problems but also those countries have better health outcomes, longer life expectancy, and more efficient healthcare.
You say that none of this stuff would work in "a culture that isn't Japanese", but what you really mean is that it wouldn't work "in a culture which is American", so maybe that's a good place to start looking for things to change.
> Fundamentally though this is a common American attitude. Look at something that's new and different and say "This would be bad for these reasons"
Among the other bits of wrongness in your comment this is spectacular. Americans are utterly addicted to novelty.
Japan being a well functioning society is not "new and different".
I can tell you haven't been to japan, the noise and litter issues aren't as much of a problem there.
Get to the bottom of why that is and you'll probably have a good understanding where the problems to address are.
Is it the monoethnicity?
Do you think being prosocial is genetic?
I have no idea. You clearly do, because you know an answer you're inviting all of us to guess.
Exactly what I was thinking. In Europe (e.g. UK or Germany) people often complain when chip shops or other fried food establishments open below them, because of the constant smells.
I wonder how much of these architecture, building etc decisions are because of higher percentage of aging population. In the west, we see more anti-homeless designs (spikes, removing benches in train stations etc) which is sad
I had to laugh when they put a quote from a wheelchair user at the top of the article. Japan is many good things, but friendly to wheelchair users is not one of them.
As western tourists always seem to find out when they land with their gigantic suitcases, many Tokyo train stations require stairs to enter or exit.
on tokyo train and subway stations specifically: maybe in the past they weren't accessible, but at least since the olympics, they've become so. i believe they're closing in on 100% now.
Not even close. They're better than they used to be, and the major stations that tourists go to are mostly kinda-sorta OK, but the median station has 1 elevator if you're lucky, and probably around the same number of accessible entrances.
...and we haven't even discussed the fact that riding the train with a wheelchair typically involves reservation of a staff member on each end of the journey, to help you get on and off.
i'd be interested learning how you've come up with that - it's disinformation. i'm speaking from extensive, direct experience.
> I'd be interested learning how you've come up with that - it's disinformation. i'm speaking from extensive, direct experience.
I live here and have eyes. But tell me more about "disinformation."
Tokyo metro's standard for accessibility is to have one route that is accessible from street level to the platform. That's fine, but it's a far cry from every entrance being accessible, or even just ensuring that you don't require staff support to make it through that route. Consider Takadanobaba [1] -- a major transit point that I know well. Yes, it's technically "one route", but just taking into account subway station exits (and not Seibu or JR line transfers, which are harder), it qualifies only because it has a single elevator that goes to ground. Literally every other exit is inaccessible.
[1] https://www.tokyometro.jp/lang_en/station/takadanobaba/index...
i use the subway here nearly everyday - many different routes, not just touristy areas, often to small stations on the outskirts of the city, or other places i haven't been, just for fun. i don't think i've ever seen a station with only one elevator, it's always at least one platform-to-ticket-gate, and one ticket-gate-to-ground (maybe that's what you meant). the worst i've experienced has been a wheelchair-accessible stair lift or escalator (a bit dreadful, but they do work). if you want to do some random sampling, pull up a random station map and check the accessible routes.
(i use a wheelchair.)
> I don't think i've ever seen a station with only one elevator, it's always at least one platform-to-ticket-gate, and one ticket-gate-to-ground (maybe that's what you meant).
Well, first, I'm talking not just about the subway, but all rail lines, which is a higher bar.
Setting that aside, what I meant was what you've inferred -- there's typically one elevator path that will get you out of an "accessible" station. Yes, that (usually) requires one elevator per platform to work at all, but it still leaves most exits inaccessible in the average case.
I started this subthread only by saying that Tokyo is not particularly wheelchair friendly. If you use one, I don't know how you could possibly dispute this. It's a land of staircases, and I've been repeatedly foiled just trying to move heavy luggage.
I grant you that in Japan they will usually bend over backwards to make something work, but I really feel for disabled folks here.
yeah, that's mostly correct, but i don't see it as a barrier. i don't think an elevator needs to be slammed down next to every staircase. if there's a way in, and a way out, i consider that a win. will i lose maybe 5 minutes because the accessible entrance is not in the most convenient location that day? perhaps. but it's just that - an inconvenience.
on the staff support: i don't really see any problem here at all. in fact, i think the service that the staff provides is truly excellent. most lines have nearly level train-to-platform gaps, but if i feel like i need a ramp, i can ask the attendant at the gate, and they will arrange for someone to quickly unfold a portable ramp when the train arrives, and for someone to do the same at the destination, exactly where i arrive. (coming from the US, can i imagine this level of service at any US city? uh, yeah, no.)
> if there's a way in, and a way out, i consider that a win. will i lose maybe 5 minutes because the accessible entrance is not in the most convenient location that day? perhaps. but it's just that - an inconvenience.
I get that, and I also don't think they need to plop an elevator at every staircase, but there are so many stations where they could have ramps or some other minor improvement to make more exits accessible. And if the one path drops you on the wrong side of the tracks from your destination, that's often more than a five-minute problem.
> on the staff support: i don't really see any problem here at all. in fact, i think the service that the staff provides is truly excellent.
I agree. I just made a similar comment on your other response. Compared to many places in the world, they're at least trying.
#4 "Maintain Manners" is hardly simple.
It needs critical mass, but then it cascades.
If you read through the description, what they talk about is that the culture is built around the idea of the individual being part of something bigger, and that consideration and respect for that something bigger (other people), is core to your own identity.
That's not hard for a lot of cultures, but it's almost impossible for most cultures in the Western hemisphere, and to change it would require a cultural reset that would run against the grain of many things that make those cultures what they are.
If it were possible though - and there are times when certain subcultures had standards of etiquette different to those widely accepted today in the West - it wouldn't need 100% of people to "sign up", just enough to make it ostracising to not conform. And then the outliers would conform.
We do this already: it's OK (albeit illegal), to cycle through a red light where I live, because lots of people do it, but if you were to try and get served ahead of your turn in a pub, you might get into an argument, because nobody does that without expecting a problem.
The cracks are already there though in Japan where this is starting to fall apart and has fueled a substantial rise in anti-immigration sentiment there. Particularly at specific groups that are not assimilating (but affecting basically every immigrant).
I feel like half your post is dancing around not saying this.
I'm not saying this, because I'm not aware of this. I have a friend who is enjoying living in Osaka, but I wouldn't feel qualified to talk about Japanese sentiment towards him or any other group of non-natives.
I'm saying that culture spreads through fear of being ostracized and the cost of not conforming to that culture. This is true in any country. It seems Japan has a "broader" and "firmer" culture that is rooted in respect to others, but it would take some serious effort for a similar culture to take hold in Europe or the US, I think.
A sense of "non conformity" leading to issues is not unique to Japan though, in Europe it is described as a problem with "multiculturalism".
The British (of which I am one), have spent thousands of years stealing the best bits of immigrant culture but seem to have forgotten that (or have been unable to absorb, for whatever reason), for the last ~60 years. That's leading to a rise in far-right sentiment and a growing desire for mono-culturalism. I can see evidence of that in Germany, France and other European nations. I could easily imagine it appearing more in Japan.
This is the flip side of East Asian societies where everything is polite and orderly: they're also extremely conformist (sometimes stifling so), and the conformity and good manners are maintained by strict social policing (it's not much fun to stand out and be different)
simple and easy aren't synonyms. It's a simple rule, but very difficult to implement.
It's brief but it's not simple. "Manners" is an extremely complicated concept.
What qualifies as good manners varies from situation to situation, but the concept of acting with good manners is hardly complicated (conform to the expected behavior of the situation).
Enforcment is a matter of encoding the rules and then applying a carrot and/or stick -- same as any other rule.
"Conform to the expected behavior of the situation" is incredibly complicated. What is the situation? How do you determine what the expected behavior is? What exactly does conforming consist of?
It takes humans years to learn how to do this. Entire books are written on the subject. A major medical disorder affecting millions of people includes a persistent difficulty doing this specific thing. Even normal people have to put serious effort into this if they visit a place where societal norms are different from what they're used to.
If it's not complicated, then I'm sure you can write down the rules for some specific situation real quick. Go ahead....
That's the key one -- it should be first and maybe the only one on the list. Japan is mono-culture and high-trust. They are all on the same page. You can't replicate that in western cities any more, such as the US or Europe. In some ways it's at odds with the idea of globalization and multiculturalism.
It's been done before, and continues to be done in some places. It requires high group trust, and a strong group identity.
In some places it is something sadly absent or overlooked...
And with countries with lots of newcomers it can take decades (well, generations) to take on the host countries manners rather than sticking to home country manners that may not mesh with host country’s manners/customs.
It's simple if your city is full of Japanese people.
I don’t know. I, the individual, can maintain a lot of manners fairly simply if I really wanted to.
I think they are saying that it's difficult to "maintain manners" for hundreds of thousands to millions of diverse "I, the individual" 's. It's great that you don't struggle with that yourself, but your manners can be made entirely irrelevant by 1 person in a public place who has anti-social behaviors (doesn't share the same set of "required" values for that society).
The actual question is if you could move to another country with a very different system of "manners" (read: culture) and throw out your learned behavior and adopt theirs.
My experience living in an incredibly multi-cultural immigrant dense area, is overwhelmingly "No". People like their "home" cultures (generally they believe its the best), and they tend to carry some degree of resentment for their new society for not recognizing that. It creates endless friction at the edges (whereas core values tend to be pretty similar globally).
Japan doesn't really deal with this at all, and what immigrant ingress they have is usually fueled by people trying to live a Japanese like life.
Looked at the report. They only show the top 10 and bottom 10 cities. Which has very limited use. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Liveability_Index#2026
The BBC forgot - or, as is more likely, refused to mention - rule #0: ensure a homogeneous culture with rather stringent rules around public behaviour.
Why is everyone interviewed a gaijin?
Take with a mountain of salt.
Probably because you need separation from the culture to fully evaluate and appreciate it. If they interviewed someone from Japan, that person would probably complain about how un-livable Japan has become. Like the subway trains are always full and they have to wait five minutes for the next one.
Rule 1: be filled with Japanese people
Cities and any polity or group of people cannot be created by some abstract rules or enforced. You need it to be composed of individuals who are disposed to act harmoniously with each other and have a culture (which is basically a bunch of jigging to aid harmonious interactions, you cannot create top down the manners you don't want people to violate). Everyone acting in their own self-interest ends up creating a harmonious organization because all of their self-interest corresponds such that their self interest is reflected in the good of the whole.
Just as a feedback system, if there is something wrong in a city or organization if the person who encounters it sees it as contrary to their own self interest and is capable of dealing with it themselves they will.
If this internal principle does not exist you rely on top down surveillance and enforcement which is basically delusional if it works will only be through violent enforcement against the people. Again in terms of a feedback system, if the polity is constructed out of a bunch of individuals who have a self-interest that corresponds with the good of the whole, there is no need to propagate that information to some manager. The persons directly involved with it are capable of dealing with it mindful of it's impact on the good of the whole because it's good for them. If you do not have that you would need a system of management, evaluation, and enforcement which basically demands the disruption in question is something easy to communicate and form policies around. Anything that cannot be just cannot be dealt with and the system falls under it's own weight. That's why technocracy is a delusion that is always doomed to fail, if the individual units in a system are unable to deal with aberrations on their own it requires the whole mass of bureaucracy to evaluate, construct policies, enforce etc. That is only capable of handling anything which is understandable to that kind of system, which is a small fraction of actual disruptions.
I appreciate the efforts of people trying to emulate the positives of Japanese cities mimicking the externals of it and enforcing it on other people is the opposite of any actual organic system and itself prohibits the more dynamic system that is required for an actually stable polity. If someone sees a wallet on the street they have to see it as their own self-interest not to steal it. If people do not see themselves as having a shared self-interest with those around them there is no enforcement or rules or policies that can make that polity stable or harmonious.
Maybe people just want to prevent getting arrested for a crime.
Seems like the hardly arrest the innocent, even if they didn’t do it
https://www.hrw.org/news/2024/11/04/inquiry-needed-japans-fl...
> "Japan is built to work for everyone," says Josh Grisdale
Well - the article does not talk about the more recent hostility to gaijin in Japan.
Example (article) from a year ago:
https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2025/09/21/j...
You can find similar articles by other media outlets. Japan has changed - and is changing. I've also noticed this on youtube, e. g. Paolo from Tokyo suddenly praising new restrictive laws. That was a strong indicator that Japan really fundamentally changed here. An old chinese stratagem is to hide the dagger behind the smile: https://www.echineselearning.com/blog/chinese-slang-hide-a-d...
I am not in any way applying that this applies to all japanese as such, of course; but I am more referring here to a trend where things are changing to the worse. Also, cost of living is high and there is an overcrowding problem in many of the cities. Even then I think the only city that would interest me is Tokio.
See also Jane Jacob’s The Death and Life of Great American Cities.
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