It was also around the same time, last Tuesday, on Christmas eve, that officials from a joint panel from the environment and trade ministries put forward a plan to slice emissions by 60% by 2035 and 73% by 2040, in line with their grand plan of achieving carbon neutrality by 2050[1]. Last December, we entered a confusing period of oscillating between sunny fall afternoons and chilly winter nights. Tourists who visited Mt Fuji were disappointed to discover the late arrival of its famous snowy cap, due to record-high fall temperatures late 2024[2].
Every spring and fall, families and friends flock to this one popular destination for annual spring or autumn walks in the park, the Meiji Jingu Gaien, the “outer garden” to the Meiji Shrine, one of the most important Shinto shrines, to which it is located east. Completed and dedicated to the Meiji Shrine in 1926, the Gaien was constructed with the concerted effort of the Japanese people nationwide, through donations of trees and money and help from youth group volunteers to build the Meiji Memorial Picture Gallery, Constitution Memorial Hall and sports facilities such as the track and field stadium, Jingu Stadium and sumo facility. It also includes the iconic Ginkgo Avenue, an iconic 300 metre-long entranceway lined with 146 ginkgo trees planted 9 metres apart[3], completed in 1923. In 1945, the Gaien that was meant to symbolise the influence of the Emperor Meiji (1852-1912) and Empress Shoken (1849-1914), was taken over by the GHQ of the Allied forces to be used as an athletic venue for US soldiers and officers. Later, the Jingu Gaien District was designated as a landscape conservation district in 1951 and 1970[4]. Today, the Gaien remains an important cultural, sports and recreational hub for visitors across generations.
A nearby companion of the Meiji Jingu Gaien, is the incredible foliage of Meiji Jingu Naien (“inner garden”), a man-made sacred forest of 70 hectares (700,000 square metres) also called the “Eternal Forest” (“Eien-no-Mori”). This was made in 1920, when the Meiji Jingu Shrine was built, by the hands of 110,000 volunteers who replanted an estimated 100,000 trees donated from across Japan in honor of Emperor Meiji and Empress Shoken. The “Eternal Forest”, which houses 234 different varieties of trees, was named as such to symbolise the intentions behind its forest planning of ensuring that the forest survives in the next hundred years. The sacred forest was created to be self-regenerating and has not faced any human intervention since its creation - flora and fauna situated here are self-sustaining, and fallen or withered plants are left to naturally return to the soil[5].
The preservation and sanctity of both Gaien and Naien are threatened by a 10-year, multi-billion dollar redevelopment plan, “Jingu Gaien District Urban Redevelopment Plan”, led by real-estate giant Mitsui Fudosan. Located in the vicinity of one of the largest green lungs of metropolitan Tokyo, 2,191 square kilometres of Tokyo Metropolis[6] - this pair of green lungs has already been shrinking, with tree canopy cover reduced by 1.9% between 2013 to 2022. The Gaien redevelopment plan is just one of many private financing initiatives, where parks are being redeveloped for financial interest[7], contributing to the shrinking lung phenomenon. Two skyscrapers will be built, the entire area save for the gingko trees, will be redeveloped to include a hotel and two stadiums.
The redevelopment plan was met with intense backlash: protests from the Japanese bar association[8], urges from the International Association for Impact Assessments to the Tokyo Governor in June 2023 were ignored, deteriorating ginkgo tree health was flagged by a UN-affiliated environmental group, and though a “heritage alert” was issued by the Japan branch of the International Council on Monuments and Sites, this group was not consulted in assessment meetings. Yet, this plan was backed by Yuriko Koike, who renewed her third term as Tokyo’s mayor in July 2024[9], and was once environmental minister from 2003 to 2006.
Koike’s Gaien redevelopment plan endorsement hypocritically contradicts most of her prior environmental sustainability efforts which encouraged greater civic and household participation in sustainability initiatives. One such example of an initiative by her is “Team Mottainai” which aimed at fostering behavioural changes towards personal consumption habits whilst roping in cooperation on a local governmental level[10]. By endorsing a plan of large-scale environmental damage, she not only fails to set an example to citizens, but also continues to contradict herself on a promise she made in 2019, declaring that Tokyo had a responsibility as one of the world’s megacities to realise “Zero Emission Tokyo”, and her vision of achieving zero emissions by 2050[11]. This is even more shocking coming from someone whose political career was propelled by her sustainability initiative, “Cool Biz”, of wearing light casual clothes to the office to reduce air conditioning and electricity consumption. Seeing that she barely campaigned for her third term as governor, this may be a sign of Koike needing to pick up some slack, and remember the foundations of her political career.
On the upside, there have been some tiny successes. In response to backlash, the number of trees to be felled for the Gaien plan have been reduced by 124 trees, from 619 trees to 743 felled trees. Immense backlash against the project also brought the case into the public light. Then again, misleading media reporting suggests minimal or minimised environmental damage by capitalising on a reduced number of trees planned to be felled, an increased number of newly planted trees (by 261 trees, from 837 to 1,098 trees), and additional ecological research conducted on flora[12]. Newly planted trees can take decades and at times centuries before recovering a similar tree canopy cover and to offset carbon footprint[13], also requiring more resources for maintenance for growth in the early stages. Significant long-term environmental damage is unavoidable, unless these trees are kept as they are.
In the search for a balance between urbanisation and preserving our natural environment, one can look towards national traditions and shared culture as an intrinsic motivator to protecting the environment. While it is inevitable for redevelopment to take place in consistently modernising cities such as Tokyo, the Japanese people could take more action to protect the spaces that are so closely tied to their way of life. Green spaces near and in the vicinity of Shinto shrines are spiritually and religiously scared, for Shinto Shrines or Jinja usually have a tree-lined path leading to the main shrine building, where the status of a shrine is demonstrated by the architecture and size of the precinct[14] - building(s) making up the shrine, and the land on which it is built. Even if the Gaien is an exterior park to the Meiji Jingu Shrine, its spiritual connection to the Shrine and individual significance cannot be overlooked. Every new year, several million people also visit Meiji Jingu as their first shrine of the year[15], hatsu-moode, making the Meiji Jingu Shrine and Garden that surrounds it so sacred and essential to the way of life and culture of the Japanese people. As a “forest for the people” [16], Meiji Jingu Gaien is only one example, albeit one closest to many Tokyoites’ hearts, of many more memorable green spaces destroyed by urban, capitalistic profit.
For a country that prides itself for its four seasons - the shikioriori（四季折々）- if one hopes to continue enjoying the beauty of Japan’s changing seasons, foliage and their respective accompanying cultural traditions, it might be time to show more concern on both ministerial and local levels for the natural environment that one has taken for granted for so long.
References
[1] Tomoko Otake, “Japan’s weather in 2024: Record temperatures hurt people’s health and wallets”, Dec 29, 2024, The Japan Times.
[2] “Japan witnesses warmest fall on record”, Dec 3, 2024, Japan Times.
[3] “Jingu Gaien Ginkgo Avenue”, Visit Minato City, visited: December 6, 2024.
[4] “History: History of Jingu Gaien”, Jingu Gaien Machidukuri, visited: December 6, 2024.
[5] “Forest”, Meiji Jingu, visited: December 6, 2024.
[6] “Geography of Tokyo”, Tokyo Metropolitan Government, visited: December 6, 2024.
[7] David McNeill, “Life in Japan: Why is Tokyo shrinking its green spaces amid a climate emergency?”, Oct 3, 2024, The Mainichi.
[8] Mainichi Japan, “Japan lawyers’ group urges Tokyo to halt park development, calling its impact review unscientific”, Mainichi Japan, March 16, 2024.
[9] “Koike secures her third four-year term as governor of Tokyo”, The Asahi Shinbun, July 7, 2024, visited: December 6, 2024.
[10] “Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike takes part in UK Parliament House of Lords Environment and Climate Change Committee Hearing”, Japan Local Government Center, visited: December 6, 2024.
[11] Inoue, Osamu, “Leading Japan’s sustainability from Tokyo”, Sustainable Japan by The Japan Times, March 29, 2024, visited: December 6, 2024.
[12] “Greenery”, Jingu Gaien Urban Redevelopment Project.
[13] Bruce Lieberman, “The pros and cons of planting trees to address global warming”, March 19, 2020, Yale Climate Connections.
[14] “Shinto”, Jinja Honcho - The Association of Shinto Shrines -, visited: December 6, 2024.
[15] “Uniqueness”, Meiji Jingu, visited: December 6, 2024.
[16] Emiko Jozuka, et. al., “‘Like building skyscrapers in Central Park’: Tokyo redevelopment plan sparks protests”, Oct 3, 2023, CNN.