Honmoku about 60 years ago and today

History of Honmoku

Honmoku is the tip of a plateau jutting out south of the port of Yokohama, and the seaside land that opened at its foot. The chronology of Naka Ward records that Honmoku Village in the Edo period was a fishing village, favored by writers as a land of fine scenery. The aerial photographs of this location show, within the same frame, a corner where family housing for the US military lined up after the war, and just beyond it the sea being reclaimed and turning into industrial land and piers. The land has a hill at its back to the north and falls low toward the east, and where the slope ended, the land gave way to the sea.

US military housing at the tip of the cape

In the Great Yokohama Air Raid of May 1945, Naka Ward was almost entirely burned, but Honmoku, Negishi and part of Yamate survived the fire. According to the materials of the Yokohama City History Archives, Housing Area No. 1 in Honmoku was requisitioned in February 1946 and Housing Area No. 2 in October of the same year, and family housing for US military personnel was built. The city's materials write that the site was laid out generously and was a small American town, complete with shops, grocery stores, sports grounds and even a theater.

The 1945-50 photograph shows that housing area clearly. A corner where white square buildings line up in many rows, in the same orientation and at the same intervals, lies upper right of the center, on flat land near the shore. The rows of Japanese houses around it are packed irregularly, and the difference in arrangement is plain. Bright ground that looks scraped white spreads just north of the center, and the rows of buildings continue there too. The right half of the frame is sea, and the shoreline draws a natural arc around the tip of the cape and turns west in the middle of the bottom of the frame. Offshore, lots that look like black strips lined up continue in a grid. The chronology says that nori seaweed was grown off Honmoku, and these seem to be farming racks. Similar rows can be seen in the inlet at the lower left too. The upper left of the frame is a wooded hill, houses are crowded along the valleys, and a single road passes east-west along the foot of the hill. A quay and buildings that look like warehouses stand in the middle of the top edge, and the southern end of the port reached this far.

Twenty years in which the sea receded

Reclamation of the waters of Negishi Bay broke ground in February 1959, and large industrial land was created offshore from Honmoku to Negishi. The chronology says that in March 1963 there was a completion ceremony for the first phase of reclamation, and in October of the same year work began on creating land for related industries at Honmoku Pier. In May 1964 the Negishi Line opened from Sakuragicho to Isogo, and Yamate Station was newly established at that time.

In the 1961-69 photograph, the upper half of the frame is washed out white, and the details of the housing area can barely be read. Within the white, it is just possible to make out the shadows of rows of buildings. Even so, if you look at the lower half, the change is clear at a glance. The right and bottom of the frame, which were sea in 1945-50, have mostly turned into land, and on the reclaimed land at the lower left, round storage tanks line up regularly. A large ship is moored alongside the quay, and a thin landing pier extends offshore. On the new land on the right, long buildings that look like warehouses and quays line up, and several ships are berthed. South of the center, a hill of dense trees appears as a black mass, and from its eastern slope down to the flat land, rows of houses are packed eave to eave. The arc of the former shoreline was left as it was, as the curve of a single road.

The appearance of the housing area can be seen well in 1974-78. An expanse of yellowish grassland surrounds the center, and small buildings are placed sparsely along gently curving roads. The difference in density from the Japanese town on the south side, where small roofs are packed closely together, is obvious. A long elevated line runs north-south along the eastern edge, and beyond it large buildings with red roofs and warehouses with blue roofs line up. On the reclaimed land to the south, the white round storage tanks have increased in number. In the 1979-83 image, the top third is missing, and the area around the center is also painted black and not shown. Only the lower half can be read, and the wooded hill, the packed rows of houses, the curving road and the rows of storage tanks stand in almost the same form as in the previous era.

New blocks after the return

The US military housing in Honmoku continued to be used for a long time under the Japan-US Security Treaty. The chronology says that in August 1981, the year before the return, the last Japan-US friendship Bon dance festival was held in the store plaza of the housing area. The return was on March 31, 1982, and the top 10 Yokohama news stories of that year compiled by the City of Yokohama list in first place the return of 810,000 square meters across three US military facilities, including the Yokohama Beach Housing in Honmoku. In January of the same year, 1982, the land readjustment project for the Shin-Honmoku district was approved, and work on the basic infrastructure began in November. In March 1987 the land readjustment was finished, and the first residents moved into a 12-story condominium built in the apartment housing zone on the sea side. In April 1989, the shopping center Mycal Honmoku opened on the readjusted land.

The 1987-90 photograph captures exactly that period of construction. Around the center, the grassland housing area has turned into bare ground, and the lines of newly drawn roads cut the area into fine lots. Almost no buildings are standing yet. Northeast of the center, many large dark buildings that were not there before line up. In today's photograph, the lots that were bare ground are filled with mid-rise buildings and houses, and the streets draw a neat grid. The Japanese town to the south remains with its original irregular alleys, so the boundary of the land readjustment area can be read as a difference in the shape of the streets.

The curving road that runs around the bottom of the frame overlaps with an elevated road built later, and connects to the elevated line running north-south along the eastern edge. The storage tanks on the reclaimed land to the south remain in almost the same arrangement as in 1974-78, and along the eastern quay the roofs of large warehouses line up. A green space holding a pond lies southwest of the center, continuing without changing its outline since the 1974-78 photograph.

Traces remain on the sea side too. The road that curves around the bottom of the frame almost overlaps with the shoreline shown in the 1945-50 photograph. The storage tanks and factory land outside it were all born from postwar reclamation. The flat land in the center and the east is only slightly higher above sea level than the hill to the north. The assumed flooding on the lowland and the reclaimed land is shown in the City of Yokohama's hazard map.