
Tsukiji: So long, and thanks for all the fish - e15ctr0n
http://www.economist.com/news/asia/21685510-so-long-and-thanks-all-fish
======
it_learnses
I hate the olympics. It's a huge waste of money and resources and robs the
taxpayers. Wish we could just always have it in Greece or something rather
than moving it every time.

~~~
hkmurakami
Case in point: Tokyo Olympic budget is now 6x what they originally announced,
and is currently expected to ring in at $15Billion (assuming exchange rate of
120 Yen to the dollar).

They will almost certainly be unprofitable.

Seems almost like a handout to general contractors =/. (There's already been a
scandal with the logo having been a "hand out" to a designer)

[http://www.huffingtonpost.jp/shun-otokita/olympic-
budget_b_8...](http://www.huffingtonpost.jp/shun-otokita/olympic-
budget_b_8865626.html)

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buro9
In London a market has been at the site of Smithfield for over 1,000 years:
[http://www.smithfieldmarket.com/the-market/the-market-
today/](http://www.smithfieldmarket.com/the-market/the-market-today/)

Over the next few years it will see a transformation as the market is moved
East beyond the existing Olympic site and the old market site becomes another
block of glass offices and shops:
[http://www.constructionenquirer.com/2013/07/17/contentious-s...](http://www.constructionenquirer.com/2013/07/17/contentious-
smithfield-market-rebuild-approved/)

Currently it's blocked though, local resistance did make a difference:
[https://www.london.gov.uk/moderngov/documents/s44835/Appendi...](https://www.london.gov.uk/moderngov/documents/s44835/Appendix%201%20-%20Summary%20of%20Smithfield%20Market%20Site%20Visit.pdf)

It's the same story everywhere, and it has a lot to do with city growth. These
markets are still central to their cities and deliveries are now by HGVs which
cannot fit the spaces easily. The roads around cannot take the congestion of
vans and re-deliveries, and the land itself now has a very different (much
higher) value if used for a different purpose.

A lot of the old city markets face the same fate.

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lisper
Tsukiji is fascinating, but also a bit sad. After visiting there I am amazed
that there are any fish left in the sea. The scale of the place is truly mind-
boggling. I kept imagining a sign hanging over the door that said, "All hope
abandon ye fish who enter here."

But the sushi in the nearby restaurants was the best I've ever had before or
since.

~~~
hkmurakami
For those who are curious, Sushi Dai is considered hands down the best sushi
place inside the Tsukiji market. However, the wait is typically 4+ hours. If
you get in line even before the first trains, the wait can be as short as 90
minutes. Anything shorter than that is blind luck.

Daiwa Sushi is typically considered second. Lines are typically around 45
minutes long.

~~~
viraptor
The fun part is standing for an hour in a queue that leads to the small street
so you can queue some more to the actual place :)

But the other restaurants (if you can call them that) in the same street are
amazing too. I doubt I'd be able tell a difference between them.

Edit: for people who haven't seen this great establishment, here's the queue
and the view on the restaurants:
[https://tinyurl.com/j8efukr](https://tinyurl.com/j8efukr)

~~~
hkmurakami
Be careful not to get run over by those fish carrying mini-truck things while
queueing in that small street! :)

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kohsuke
I just went to Tsukiji on the opening day of this new year. As the article
states, this is the last year of the 70+ year history of the Tsukiji market.

If you can read it, this document
<[http://www.shijou.metro.tokyo.jp/pdf/book/book_all.pdf>](http://www.shijou.metro.tokyo.jp/pdf/book/book_all.pdf>)
by the city government, who owns the market, covers the context, motivations,
and efforts that had gone into the migration of the fish market from Tsukiji
to Toyosu.

I was originally skeptical why it couldn't be re-developed in its current
site. After all, many more ambitious redevelopment projects have been
successfully done in Tokyo. For example, Shibuya station, which is used by
more than two million people every day, has been going through a major
redevelopment. The same with freeways in Boston aka "Big Dig." Granted, these
projects take long time and is a major annoyance, nonetheless it proves that
massive redevelopment projects are possible.

The document I mentioned earlier gives a nice short overview of why it is not
so for Tsukiji. The main arguments are:

* Redevelopment needs a temporary on-site space but Tsukiji is so overcrowded at this point that this is not possible

* Unlike users of train stations, users of Tsukiji (food, fish, trucks, and cars) aren't very compatible with multi story buildings, yet the site is too small to have a flat single story building, which is why they feel the need to move in the first place.

* The government wants to build a closed walled building for the new market. In contrast, today the market has just the roof and no walls, and it's indeed not very clean (at least for the Japanese standard.)

In reference to the soil contamination problem mentioned in the economist
article, the government apparently replaced the top 15 feet worth of soil for
40ha, which had cost whopping half a billion dollars (!)

I'd be curious to read a similar comprehensive argument from those who oppose
the migration.

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dageshi
My personal anecdote from Tsukiji was one of the auctions. There were a bunch
of tuna, I think some frozen some not, layed out on the ground, a guy comes up
and puts a small plastic crate on the ground and stands on it and begins the
auction. The thing that struck me was the rythm it was exactly the same as the
auctioneers used in my home of England in cattle/sheep auctions. Even if you
didn't speak the language, as soon as you heard it you knew exactly what it
was.

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situationista
A short (12') film I made in 2006 after a 3.30 am visit to the Tsukiji tuna
auction - such access would be impossible now. (The whole thing is pretty
amazing, but the auction at the end is absolutely mesmerizing)
[https://vimeo.com/8982166](https://vimeo.com/8982166)

~~~
allenguo
This is fascinating. What's the auction man at the end saying?

~~~
huac
it looks like he's asking how many people are still in at a certain price
point (though my japanese is terrible)

fantastic video btw.

~~~
jpatokal
My Japanese is fairly fluent, but the guy around 08:00 is pretty much totally
incomprehensible...

The later dude at 10:00 seems to be announcing lot numbers ("16-ban"), doing
the auction in ten-thousands ("75" for 75,000 yen?) and then announcing the
winner ("Ebisuuuuu!") before going to the next.

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aaronbrethorst
Wow, that sucks. Wandering around Tsukiji was one of my favorite experiences
of being in Tokyo some years ago. If you have the chance to go before it
closes, I urge you to do so.

~~~
deutronium
Yeah I found it incredibly fascinating too!

Here's a few photos I took there:

[https://www.flickr.com/photos/strangedoodle/5482482323/](https://www.flickr.com/photos/strangedoodle/5482482323/)

[https://www.flickr.com/photos/strangedoodle/4937955625/](https://www.flickr.com/photos/strangedoodle/4937955625/)

[https://www.flickr.com/photos/strangedoodle/5483075572/](https://www.flickr.com/photos/strangedoodle/5483075572/)

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staunch
It's a bit sad but makes a lot of sense. Tsukiji is incredibly haphazard and
dirty by modern Japanese standards. And it's not like the area lacks for
authentic fishing destinations.

Thanks for all the fish, it was delicious!

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tptacek
Check this out for a good quick description of Tsukiji:

[http://www.cookingissues.com/index.html%3Fp=5630.html](http://www.cookingissues.com/index.html%3Fp=5630.html)

(The author is Dave Arnold, the host of Cooking Issues and operator of the
Booker and Dax bar in NYC; Nastassia works for him, and Mark Ladner is the
A-list chef-operator of Del Posto.)

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jpatokal
Many Tsukiji romanticists don't realize just how centrally located the current
market is. It's a ten-minute walk, literally just _one kilometer_ away from
the Ginza, which is the most expensive real estate in Tokyo:

[https://goo.gl/maps/vQrLyjDXZLz](https://goo.gl/maps/vQrLyjDXZLz)

Zoom out to get some additional perspective. So aside from being a tourist
attraction, it doesn't make any sense for the market to be there. The new
market, in Toyosu, is closer to expressways and the sea, and even has a
(currently very quiet) train station ready waiting for the day it opens:

[https://goo.gl/maps/CmQ97P4MgSS2](https://goo.gl/maps/CmQ97P4MgSS2)

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SeoxyS
I highly recommend that anyone who has yet been able to make it to the Tsukiji
fish market does so before its demise later this year. It's a truly incredible
place, and the Sushi holes there are the most incredible fish you'll eat
anywhere in the world.

I have not have a meal that was better than the 15min Omakase Sushi meal I ate
there at 5am after an hour of lining up.

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dahdum
I was lucky enough to do a sushi workshop tour of Tsujiki on the auction day
(auction itself was closed to tourists). It was incredibly cramped and hectic,
but has a lot of charm. I'm not surprised moving it has little support, it
will uproot or kill many local businesses servicing the area for generations.
Definitely worth visiting if you can before then.

------
Zikes
From an outsider's perspective, Japan seems to have a very strong grip on
their cultural history. I can understand why they have resisted relocating the
market, and why they will mourn its destruction.

On the other hand, they seem to be facing a number of crises involving the
nation's youth, who seem to be growing increasingly detached from
responsibility and ambition [1]. In the article they talk about how doggedly
old-fashioned the market's purveyors are, eschewing computers in favor of
paper and pencil. I know there are significant differences between Japan and
Western cultures, but I'm pretty sure their youth crave technology and
progress as much as does our own.

Again, this is all through a fairly Western lens, but if there were a large,
aging building in my area that the city wanted to relocate in order to build
new businesses and services, I would be much more excited at the prospective
new opportunities than I would be upset at the potential cultural loss.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NEET#Japan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NEET#Japan)

~~~
brenschluss
> but if there were a large, aging building in my area that the city wanted to
> relocate in order to build new businesses and services

But Tsukiji's not an "aging building"; it's a bustling, energetic
neighborhood. It's the _biggest fish market in the world_. They sell any kind
of fish or seafood you can think of, and those you can't dream of, also. Some
of the best sushi restaurants in Japan are in the area (Sushi Dai, for one).
It's a marvel of efficiency and economy - specialized transport carts with
zero turning radii, etc.

I'd be sad if my city wanted to move one of its biggest markets, dealing with
a food culture absolutely integral to my country's history, to a contaminated
toxic site, because it wanted to create a temporary press site & traffic
artery for a temporary sports event.

But of course, it's the other way around; giant events like the Olympics or
the World Cup are political opportunities for megaprojects/infrastructure to
be pushed through under the excuse of being a host city. Most probably, the
Tokyo city government has been wanting to move the Tsukiji market for a while,
and the Olympics is a great excuse under which to do so.

~~~
Grue3
I was staying near Tsukiji market while in Japan. Sadly never got around to
visiting the auctions, but when I was walking around the market I noticed that
it's literally next to Ginza neighborhood with lots of highrise offices. If
the market is gone, the land on which it was located would be very valuable
indeed. Proximity to upscale district and plenty of waterfront property. It's
really not a place where a sprawling fish market should be.

~~~
brenschluss
> If the market is gone, the land on which it was located would be very
> valuable indeed. Proximity to upscale district and plenty of waterfront
> property. It's really not a place where a sprawling fish market should be.

Land valuation is based off of the revenue the land generates, plain and
simple. The 'value of a land' is thus an index of the real estate market, and
does not involve any positive (or negative) externalities involved in
considering the use of land, density of land, mix of programs of land, etc.

At times, it may be important to support and privilege land uses that don't
maximally contribute to revenue but contribute to other land that contribute
to revenue.

To use the metaphor of food consumption, it would be like assuming that the
value of food lies in the energy that it provides to the body, so drinking
water is pointless because water has zero calories. Indeed, like a body,
cities are metabolic entities.

The notion that urban planning decisions need to be based off of (short-term)
market-based valuation misses the potential to invest in long-term positive
externalities. Infrastructure is not something that can be effectively funded
by a market, because markets lack a proper valuation criterion.

So - the land on which Tsukiji is located is very valuable inded. And Toyosu,
where it's going, is actually pretty close. But "moving the fish market will
create valuable land for Ginza's overpriced highrise offices" is a short-term
strategy, plain and simple; in this case, perhaps it's one that makes sense.

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nlawalker
Will Tsukiji remain in full operation until the shutdown date in November, or
is it going to wind down? I'm planning on visiting Japan for the first time in
Sep/Oct and was hoping to see it in full swing.

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maaku
The best sashimi I have ever had is from the small street stalls in front of
the Tsukiji fish market. What will happen to those vendors?

I worry there's a lot of surrounding culture and history that will die rather
than move :(

