The Yamate tunnel （山手トンネル）is one of the biggest construction projects underway in Tokyo at the moment. It's an 11km tunnel running around the west side of the city, with exits at various points along the way.
Our office is very close to where it comes up in Meguro. It's pretty impressive as the roads emerge from about 30m underground, and enter a huge round concrete structure, which sends them spiralling up to about 30m above ground where they join another motorway.
It's the kind of project where you look at the plans and think "no way, that's crazy' …and then look at it in reality and think 'no way, that's really crazy!'
This photo is a panorama my iPhone stitched together, just showing one corner of the construction site. All round this area there's huge holes in the ground (surrounded by fences and people waving red batons of course!) from which tonnes of soil are taken away and into which tonnes of concrete are being poured.
I'd love to go down there and have a look, but guess I'll have wait until it's complete! I'm just in the process of getting my drivers licence translated, so look forward to doing a bit of driving in Tokyo this year - it's kinda scary, but I love it!
Have you driven in Japan?
Joseph
