Landing in Kai Tak was immense fun (probably not if flying scares you shitless).
If the plane would have been a little slower you could have checked out what's on TV in the living rooms of the high rises during touch-down.
Crazy dangerous is a bit of an exaggeration[1]. That said: Due to the layout (the runway running directly into the harbour) and it's location in the middle of the city it was a challenging airport for pilots to operate.
Additional specific training was required for pilots to take off and land in Kai Tak.
That's what I thought of too! Saw this very fascinating but all too brief mention of the move in this old documentary: https://youtu.be/DVntiGI7QzU?t=2235
> In 1937, the area of Toyosu was created on reclaimed land.
> Toyosu was chosen in 2001 by former Governor of Tokyo Shintarō Ishihara for relocating Tsukiji fish market, but there was a longstanding controversy over this plan due to the toxic contamination of the chosen relocation area. The move to Toyosu Market was planned to have taken place in November 2016, in preparation for the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo. Part of the plan was to retain a retail market, roughly a quarter of the current operation, in Tsukiji.
> On 31 August 2016, the Tsukiji fish market move was indefinitely postponed. The Tsukiji fish market was caught in a controversy with the shop owners surrounding the former fish market rioting as they would lose their job if the fish market transfers its location.
> Opening of the fish market was subsequently rescheduled for 11 October 2018 despite concerns about pollution.
Just yesterday I headed to a local (I live in Tokyo) sushi restaurant that has an "everything's at half price" price day once in a month. Turns out they had to cancel the event this time because they didn't have enough ingredients. A bummer, but on the other hand I was slightly amused that this migration event had an impact to my life too.
Oh dang, I didn't realize it was happening this soon. I'm visiting Japan next week and I thought I would have at least a few more days to visit old Tsukiji again.
It might not be worth doing: they now restrict tourists from entering until 11am, at which time most of the sellers have already finished selling, cleaned up and gone home.
(The eart morning Tuna auction may be a different story however)
However, taking a tour of the outer (non-wholesale) market is worth doing.
I visited Tsukiji just a few years ago and it was extremely overrated. Just messy, busy, and the sushi you could eat there was no better than what you could get in nice sushi restaurants. Japanese themselves dont understand why foreigners go there.
It's touristy, but most travelers want to do the touristy stuff anyway. As far as touristy stuff goes, it's certainly far from the worst. I went there a few weeks ago because a Japanese friend had never been and wanted to go before it closed down, we had morning beers, a sushi lunch, and then went to hang in the nearby Hamarikyu gardens, it was a pleasant day.
We even got to see a full tuna being opened up/cleaned/cut/etc., which you don't get to see everywhere.
All that said, it remains to be seen whether the few streets of shops etc. will remain as active and bustling now that the market has moved.
I was lucky enough to go there early in the morning with a friend of mine who is a chef in a restaurant. It was really interesting but I do think that going there without a guide would be rather boring.
My second time at Daiwa in 2016, I felt really underwhelmed. I queued for around 1.5 hours and was in and out in under 20 minutes — it felt very much like I was just a tourist on a conveyor belt.
My first time in 2014 was great, but I guess it only got more touristy after.
it seems really dumb to me that they are destroying a cultural landmark just for Olympics that no one will remember or care about a few years after the fact
There have been calls to move the fish market out of Tsukiji[1] for close to a decade at least. Advocates for the move have concerns about the aging facility and desire to re-purpose high-value real-estate.
The olympics are just the impetus that finally pushed it through. I agree about the market being an iconic facility and I have good memories there myself. Hopefully the new one will be similarly accessible to tourists and an upgrade for wholesalers.
It's likely the area could also be used for new housing projects after the event. I do agree that it seems ridiculous to move the cultural landmark as it also displaces local restaurants and businesses.
The restaurants are in the outer market, which is not going anywhere. Only the inner/wholesale market, which was largely off limits to tourists, is moving.
I read it'd be a bus hub for the Olympics, but I would bet money that it too will be razed right after the games to accommodate the more prevalent need of housing or business development.
That area is prime real-estate in Tokyo. Developers have been itching to build shopping malls, etc, there for ages. It might be a parking lot during the Olympics, but afterwords it's going to be turned into something much more expensive.
The fish market, OTOH, doesn't have to be in any particular place. It needs good access to the ocean (boats) and good access to the roads (trucks). Moving it by a few miles isn't going to change their economics by much (if any).
Reminds me of when Hong Kong's crazy dangerous Kai Tak airport closed and in one night they drove everything to the new airport https://www.checkerboardhill.com/2016/12/closure-of-kai-tak-...