Bike Storage

The Japanese are serious about lots of things; fish and trains are two that come to mind. But they are also serious about bicycles. An outgrowth of the pre-war tradition bicycle riding in conjunction with the development of super cities, Japan has found a scaling problem with bicycles. While a bicycles are efficient and healthy by themselves, tens of thousands of business people riding to work can introduce storage issues.

This bike storage area is very close to my office in Toranomon. While I have not seen a sign designating it as such, I suspect this is a city owned property to facilitate the storage of bicycles. I have seen others that drawf this one.

When my father lived in the Netherlands (my birthplace) he used to ride a bicycle to the train station on his way to work. He explained once that he would ride very slowly to prevent sweating in his suit. This is much the same way that salarymen ride to work in Tokyo: slowly. The design of urban bicycles in Japan bears close resemblance to pre-war bicycles in the United States. There are purely functional for street riding and have no fancy breaking or gearing systems.

Oddly, like umbrellas (かさ), they are kosher for stealing. This generally angers the owner more than an umbrella but is considered a right of passage. I find Japanese are willing to admit they steal an occaisional umbrella but never a bicycle. Who then, may I ask, is stealing all the bicycles in Japan? I have also been told that repairing a bicycle is prohibitively expensive in Japan, such it is generally cheaper to replace the entire bicycle! This is sometimes true for something as simple as a new tire and tube.