Roads
Wednesday, November 22nd, 2006Japan has some pretty interesting and complex roads. Browsing around with Google Earth, you might find, for example, the Tokyo Bay Aqua-Line (東京湾アクアライン):
The Trans-Tokyo Bay Highway, also known as the Tokyo Bay Aqualine, is a 15.1 km marine crossing through the middle of Tokyo Bay… With the journey from Kawasaki [川崎] to Kisarazu [木更津] now taking just 15 minutes, the highway plays a vital economic role in integrating these two areas of prime industrial importance. The areas are otherwise separated by a 100-km journey through the heart of metropolitan Tokyo, so the Aqualine also eases traffic congestion in the broader metropolitan road network.
Apparently, the 31-year, $11.2 Billion project is sinking further into debt:
Traffic across the bridge (around 10000-15000 daily) is only about 1/3 of that originally planned. The toll was 4000 yen originally, but was lowered to 3000 yen in 2000 to increase traffic. Together with the high construction cost and high maintenance costs, the project is reportedly going further into debt each year.
See it for yourself:
Tokyo Aqua-Line, Kisaruazu side
Tokyo Aqua-Line, Kawasaki side
Following a tunnel a short distance north from here, you’ll find Haneda Airport (羽田空港), where the access roads seem unnecessarily complicated: