It’s a structure that will be impossible to miss: a steel-and-glass roof inspired by traditional Japanese origami, hovering above a light-flooded train station and a sprawling subterranean “city.”
The Shinagawa New Station complex will be the first new station build on Tokyo’s key JR Yamanote train line since 1971.
“It is an opportunity to design the whole area surrounding the station,” said architect Kengo Kuma, who is also designing the new national stadium for the Tokyo Games. “It would be a great project because it will connect the sea and the hill of Tokyo, which will make a new face to the city.”
Shinagawa is just one of dozens more major urban developments — from hotels and sports complexes to cloud-piercing skyscrapers — poised to transform the vista of Tokyo by the time the city raises the curtain for the 2020 Olympic Games.
According to recent figures published by Bloomberg, 45 new skyscrapers will be constructed within the city limits. If this figure is accurate, that would be mean a 50% increase in high-rises between now and 2020, compared to the previous three-year period, with the majority of projects concentrated in the central Chiyoda, Chuo and Minato districts.
The industrial Tokyo Bay area, where a number of Olympics-related facilities are being constructed, will also see significant growth. According to Hikariko Ono, a spokesperson for the Tokyo Games, eight new permanent venues, 23 existing sites and nine temporary venues will be built for the Games.
“A comprehensive set of physical, social, environmental and international legacies will result from Tokyo’s hosting of the 2020 Games,” she told CNN. “The citizens of Tokyo and Japan will benefit from significant environmental and infrastructural improvements…such as new green spaces and sport and education facilities centered on the revitalized Tokyo Bay area, creating a zone with strong appeal for Tokyo’s future development.” -CNN