Streets and Trees in Tokyo

Tokyo Streets: Tokyo is a huge city and yet, walking around in the fairly central area where the Japanese Meteorological Agency is located, near The Imperial Palace and Tokyo Railway station, it often does not feel that way. Little back streets have a small town feel with plant pots on the pavements, washing hanging outside, and telephone and electricity cables criss-crossing everywhere overhead. In contrast there are the travel intersections where pedestrian walkways carry huge numbers of commuters to their office jobs.

In 2000 we didn’t have bicycle delivery firms like “Deliveroo” but the Japanese had bicycle deliveries and the bikes that they used were adapted for the job… much better than carrying a large box on your back as is done here nowadays.

Photo Gallery: Tokyo Streets…

Tokyo Trees: Walking between the hotel and the meeting, and also some of the back streets of Tokyo, I became absorbed in studying the way the Japanese support some of the trees and also how they are often wrapped. I have not been able to find an explanation of the practice.

On the web it says that wrappings on pine trees are a defence against the Pine Moth lava and that the wooden tree supports are a defence against snow, but the those explanations don’t seem to fit what I saw on the streets of Tokyo. For example, the tree in this photo looks much stronger than the wooden “supports” surrounding it; and why is it wrapped in the way that it is?

Photo Gallery: Tree supports and wrapping…