I try to take “tourists behaving badly” stories in Japan these days with a grain of salt. Let’s be honest – if you invite three million people into your house, odds are good someone’s gonna end up puking on the carpet. And it’s not like Japanese citizens are all angelic and virtuous, either.
What I love to see, though, are stories about the positive impacts of tourism on Japan – particularly on the areas outside of the typical destinations of Tokyo, Kyoto, and Osaka. For example, there’s the town of Fujiyoshida, whose town center was dying before a surge in tourism brought it back to life.
Then there’s Shirakawa-go in Gifu Prefecture. Part of the village of Shirakawa-mura, Shirakawa-go is composed of houses built entirely in the traditional gasshou-zukuri style with thatched and angled roofs. It’s a wonderful site to behold – particularly in the winter when the snowfall covers the dwellings.
Shirakawa-mura currently consists of around 1,400 people. Around 500 live in Shirakawa-go. In 2013, the village had 150,000 foreign tourists visit. By 2019, that number had climbed to one million. Today, with tourism to Japan booming, the village sees about 1,000 times more tourists than it has residents.
That influx has created issues. The area struggles with accommodating parking and the clutter that visitors inevitably create. There have been incidents, not just of small violations like littering, but of tourists entering people’s houses to take pictures and stomping across farmer’s fields.
However, instead of locking down against tourists, the village has worked hard to make it easier to visit. Just last month, it announced a new website, SHIRAKAWA-Going (HA! get it? Get it?!?!), that displays information about current parking and crowd conditions in Japanese, English, Chinese (Mandarin and Cantonese), and French. The site also has live cameras showing current conditions.
Of course, Tourists Behaving Badly is still a concern, so the Shirakawa-go site has information about how to be one of the good tourists. The Know Before You Go section of SHIRAKAWA-Going asks people to observe five simple rules: use designated parking lots, don’t start campfires, take your trash with you, don’t try sightseeing at night (darn), and don’t bring your stupid-ass drone.
Welcoming – and controlling – tourists
The current website is the product of years of work in handling tourists. Koe Tomoyuki, the head of tourism promotion for the village, says it’s seen a huge spike in tourists in the past ten years as word of the village spread globally. (It’s been a World Heritage site since 1995.)
Kose acknowledges the crowding challenge is a tough one to solve. “Imagine everyone in Japan came to Kokubunji City in Tokyo,” he said. (Kokubunji is a city in Tokyo’s Tama area with 132,000 people. Japan’s population is 124.5 million. In other words, it’s a pretty spot-on comparison.)
What brings people to Shirakawa-go? Kose says the village is unique in that many other heritage sites are relics that have been overly commercialized. By contrast, Shirakawa-go is an active village filled with people who are going about their daily lives. That makes it unique even among Japan’s World Heritage sites.
The village recognized its value as a cultural asset decades ago, starting a Preservation Committee back in 1971. Every member of the village feels a responsibility to protect it in its current state. “From the moment you’re born here,” Kose says, “you’re part of the Preservation Committee.”
Tourism is an important part of that preservation effort. “Shirakawa-mura is in Japan’s dominant snow belt, under an environment with harsh winters. We can’t exist without tourists. It’s a close-knit group, but it also welcomes people from outside,” Kose added, noting that he also feels welcome as someone who relocated to the village.
Despite the occasional friction between tourists and locals, Kose notes that 70% of the town’s residents run businesses – restaurants, souvenirs, etc. – connected to tourism. That’s helped the town remain amiable to visitors despite the issues.
The people of Shirakawa-go, Kose says, have one wish: “We want others to fall in love with this village that we treasure.”
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