Tag Archives: Japan

Old Projects, New Phases

After years of steadily developing several long-term projects, 2018 was the year many of them dramatically changed. The Area is out in the world; my Hauts-de-France work is exhibiting; so many other projects are evolving. With those big changes in mind, here’s a recap of my work on major projects in 2018, a few highlights from smaller projects, and a little looking ahead to 2019.

The Area Film

After six years of work, The Area is screening. Since premiering at the Full Frame Film Festival in April and making its Chicago premiere at the Black Harvest Film Festival in August, we’ve been busy screening the film with an amazing set of partners, including the Metropolitan Planning Council, the Museum of Contemporary Photography, the National Public Housing Museum, universities, community organizing groups, and the Gene Siskel Film Center. To learn more about screenings, news, and requesting a screening, visit The Area’s website.

At the Black Harvest Film Festival

Black Harvest Film Festival Black Harvest Film Festival
Full Frame Film Festival Black Harvest Film Festival

Hauts-de-France Mining Basin and the Resilient Images Residency

Following a preview at Expo Chicago and multiple exhibitions in France in 2017, my Resilient Images work had its full exhibition at the Hyde Park Art Center in 2018. In June, a subset of the project returned to France for exhibition during the national urban planning conference RDV avec la Ville. I made some new work during the June visit, so I’m not quite ready to call the project complete, but I’m pleased with it and where it’s going.

Installation of Hauts-de-France Mining Basin

Cité Werth à Denain

Bean Creek in Indianapolis, Indiana

Over the last few years, I’ve been steadily developing a project in Indianapolis with support from Big Car. I tightened the work in 2018 by emphasizing how the south side neighborhood has evolved with small creek that winds through the community. The first exhibition from that residency will appear at the Tube Factory Art Space next year. The show focuses on the relationship between people and place, and puts the Bean Creek work in dialogue with my projects in The Area and Hauts-de-France. More information about the exhibition is on facebook.

Bean Creek

With a Stray Dog Strike Fear or Get Struck

Urban Farming in Milwaukee, Wisconsin

The national placemaking project Michael Carriere and I started back in 2009 is shifting from research to public engagement, with a second exhibition prepared and the book moving towards publication. In January, our exhibition Growing Place: A Visual Study of Urban Farming is opening at the Grohmann Art Museum, which situates Milwaukee’s contemporary urban farming movement in its history, drawing from archival photographs, documents, and contemporary artifacts. I’m especially excited about the programing we’re scheduling, including events with the Walnut Way Conservation Corps, Will Allen, and others. More details forthcoming!

Urban Farm Aerial

Hmong Farmer at Fondy Market

Belfast, Northern Ireland

As I wrote earlier in the year, I made my fourth visit to Belfast, Northern Ireland in July to continue documenting the changing experience of Eleventh Night and The Twelfth. Among the new work I made this year was an aerial sub-project about the aftermath of the bonfires, which helps orient the work away from the specific moment of the events.

Burning the Children's Bonfire

Bonfire Aftermath from Above

Rebuilding in Tōhoku, Japan

Last week I returned from Tōhoku, Japan, where I continued my work on the rebuilding process after the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear disaster. I’ll be sharing more photographs in the next few weeks, but here are two favorite rephotography sequences and a building happily back in use in Ishinomaki. The rebuilding process is somehow overwhelmingly fast and slow.

2014, 2016, 2018

2014, 2016, 2018

Two Buildings

SKETCHES FROM ELSEWHERE

Camden, New Jersey

In Camden, New Jersey

Camden, New Jersey to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Chicago, Illinois Region

Valentines in Whiting, Indiana

Iced Tree on Lake Michigan

Dublin, Ireland

The Gasworks

Ely, Minnesota

Ely

New Orleans, Louisiana

Ashton Theater

Paris, France Region

Les Espaces d'Abraxas

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

The Pool at the Row House

Reykjavik, Iceland Region

Icelandic Geothermal Pool

Hallgrimskirkja

Santa Fe, New Mexico

Camera Shop

San Diego, California Region

Solana Beach Transit Center

San Diego County Fair

Seattle, Washington

Oxbow Park

Olive Tower

St. Louis, Missouri

IMG_4606_7

Stockholm, Sweden

IMG_0925

Tokyo, Japan

Tokyo from Above

Isolated Tokyo

To 2019!

2016 in Review: Nearly As Much There As Here

2016 was another year of travel, but unlike previous years, my explorations were more international than domestic: for more than two months I made work in Belgium, Ethiopia, France, Ireland, Japan, Northern Ireland, and the United Arab Emirates.

One month of that period was for a residency in the North of France and Belgium. The residency, “Resilient Images,” is a joint program launched by the Hyde Park Art Center and the Centre régional de la photographie Nord—Pas-de-Calais and supported by the MacArthur Foundation, the French Embassy, and Institut Français. I will be writing more about my project in a few months, but if you’re interested in learning a little more about what I’m doing in the North, you can read a little more about it in this short interview. The rest of the summer, I continued my project about Eleventh Night and the Twelfth in Belfast, photographed in Tōhoku and showed photographs at Gallery Tanto Tempo in Japan, toured Ethiopia with friends, and visited with guest workers in Dubai.

But I also did some domestic travel, including for a show in Buffalo, New York at Dennis Maher’s incomparable Fargo House and a screening of scenes from The Area at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee’s Mobile Design Box in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I also made brief visits to the area around Louisville, Kentucky and New Orleans, Louisiana. Of course, I spent plenty of time in Chicago, Illinois and Minneapolis, Minnesota, which finally feels like home.

The other big project news is that after nearly five years, The Area is swiftly moving towards completion with Scrappers Film Group after a party and fundraiser in December. “Thank you,” everyone who attended and contributed!

I can’t possibly do justice to the places I visited in this short post, but I’ve included links to locations for which I made blog posts, and posted a few photographs from each site. If I authored a blog post about a particular visit, the section title is a link to the post.

To 2017! It’s going to be a busy one, isn’t it?

Resilient Images Residency in Hauts-de-France, France

Watching, Power Plant
Residents calling for their dog from their street.

Gathering to Depart
ATV riders gather to move from one part of a slag heap to another.


Coal cars displayed in former mining towns.

Belgium

Playing Soccer in Molenbeek
Young immigrants play soccer in Brussels’ Molenbeek neighborhood.

Belfast, Northern Ireland

Igniting the Children's Bonfire
Shankill neighborhood residents ignite their children’s bonfire.

Tōhoku, Japan

CU9I4862 Update
Post-tsunami and radiation contamination remediation in downtown Tomioka.

The “Jungle,” Calais, France

CU9I9467
The formal and informal Calais “Jungle” camps before demolition.

Ethiopia

IMG_5846
Two boys look down to their village in rural Tigray.

CU9I8533 CU9I8127c
A minibus stop and an outdoor pool hall in Addis Ababa.

CU9l1760_8
The Church of St. George in Lalibela.

Dubai, United Arab Emirates

CU9l6493_87
Scrappers remove kitchen counters from a partially demolished house.

Trucks
A small sample of the variety of modified truck designs in sand parking lots.

CU9I6215-2 CU9I5940
Two Pakistani guest workers and the largest Tim Horton’s advertisement I’ve ever seen.

Buffalo, New York

Buffalo Telescope Houses
Six new telescope house photographs I made while visiting for my exhibition.

Chicago, Illinois

IMG_8928
The beginning of the Scrappers Film Group party and fundraiser for The Area at Lost Arts.

Leaning
A leaning, isolated building near the former United States Steel South Works site.

Louisville, Kentucky

Overlooking the Ohio River
Overlooking the Ohio River and Louisville, Kentucky from Jeffersonville, Indiana.

Milwaukee, Wisconsin

IMG_3585
A major clean-up effort in a North Side neighborhood.

Minneapolis, Minnesota

CU9I7320
The Minnehaha Free Space before it was displaced by a new landlord.

IMG_7796
A former entry area of the Minneapolis Scottish Rite Temple.

New Orleans, Louisiana

IMG_8271c
Four teenagers posing outside a corner store in the Lower Ninth Ward.

Rural Minnesota

National Farmer's Bank of Owatonna
Louis Sullivan’s National Farmer's Bank of Owatonna.

Rural Wisconsin

Woodside Place
A former church in St. Croix.

Rebuilding from the 2011 Tohoku, Japan Disaster


CU9I3402
The distinctive rebuilding of the Sendai coast

When Yohei Morita and I visited Tōhoku, Japan in 2014, I was most affected by the areas decimated by the tsunami — but it wasn’t for the reasons one might imagine. With the exception of the cities still in the radiation exclusion zone, most of the quarters destroyed by the tsunami had already been cleared by the Japanese government. In these places, there were few overturned cars, thrashed buildings, derelict streets, or even memorials. With few exceptions, they were remarkably sterile places, with scant clues that the areas had ever been inhabited, not to mention inhabited and then obliterated.

The occasional signs of mayhem, like the gleaming new headstones that filled nearby cemeteries, were amplified by this context, but my main reaction was still to what wasn’t there. I was affected because I couldn’t comprehend what we were witnessing. I wasn’t prepared for this kind of devastation and response.

So when Tanto Tempo Gallery invited me to return to Japan this summer, I set aside half of the trip to revisit Tōhoku to see what had changed and to experience how my understanding of it might change too. My approach would be twofold: to match photographs I made in 2014 and to seek out new areas, particularly revitalization projects.

I will keep the text relatively short, but I should make a few notes before I get into the first set of images. An enormous amount of effort put into the region: nearly all of the towns are cleared, harbors have been reconstructed, flood walls are everywhere, new housing has been built, and people have initiated creative community building up and down the coast. Even so, my main reaction to the place remains: I can’t help but be awed by the openness of coves, the emptiness of places I know were once inhabited, and those shining cemeteries.

CU9I3707
A gate above Ishinomaki

CU9I3714 Update
Demolition and construction preparations along the city’s coast

In 2014, Yohei and I spent time with the community activists behind Space for Community, a local advocacy organization and meeting place in Ishinomaki city. After that experience, I knew I’d want to make Ishinomaki a focal point of this trip. I wasn’t able to meet with Space for Community this time around, but I visited with a number of Ishinomaki groups, including Ishinomaki Laboratory, a community-based woodworking shop. There I met with Warafuji, Takahiro Chiba, and David Wang, with whom I discussed the group’s founding, products, and future.

The organization is an hybrid community organization, essentially local but with inspiration and assistance from Tokyo-based designers. Founded in response to the disaster, the group creates and builds furniture with a straightforward, DIY design language. It is also currently strengthening a partnership with a local women’s weaving group to expand their small line of textiles. Their products are not yet available in North America but are available in Asia and Europe.


CU9I3834 CU9I3854
CU9I3836 CU9I3844
Warafuji and Takahiro Chiba in the Ishinomaki Lab workshop, some of their small wooden and textile products

After leaving Ishinomaki Lab, I took David Wang’s recommendation and headed to Hashidori Common for a meal. The food truck-like establishment was launched to provide opportunities for small restauranteurs to build their businesses while simultaneously creating an informal town square. Even on a rainy night, a dozen people were eating in the semi-covered dining areas.


CU9I3975
A customer places her order in Hashidori Common

Other than this time in Ishinomaki, most of my visit wasn’t in the town centers but retracing Yohei’s and my previous route through the costal towns and coves. I did make some new compositions during this part of the trip, but I focused on rephotographing the scenes, matching images from 2014. In these areas progress is both monumental and surprisingly slow.


CU9I4333 Update
Minor construction work continues along the Ogatsucho Mizuhama port

CU9I4458
New housing is under construction in the hills above Ogatsucho Mizuhama

CU9I4091 Update
The temporary memorial outside Okawa Elementary School has expanded

CU9I3533 Update
Tsunami damaged railroad tracks in Higashimatsushima have been removed

CU9I4068 Update
Activity continues in some places along the Kitakami River, if with reduced intensity

CU9I3588
In other locations, construction — particularly flood protection — is as active as ever

CU9I4051 Update
Elsewhere, infrastructure development (and hill removal) along the Kitakami River is nearly finished

CU9I3552 Update
I was surprised by the construction of a new (elevated) home in Higashimatsushima

CU9I4259 Update
The Christmas tree and memorial in Ogatsucho Kamiogatsu were long gone

CU9I4284
Some infrastructure had an otherworldly feel

CU9I3452
New context had sprouted around some cemeteries, like this skatepark in Sendai

While the emergent theme of the first half of the Tōhoku trip was rebuilding, driving south to the radiation affected area changed the tone. With each mile, the landscape appeared increasingly like my 2014 visit, although with warnings about radiation (and that nagging feeling about whether or not I should really travel into the former exclusion zone).

I was driving to Tomioka, a radiation-blanketed town Yohei and I visited with Deputy Mayor Hirofumi Sanpei. This time I would do the visit alone. While Yohei and I needed to be officially cleared and accompanied to visit in 2014, much had changed in the two and a half years, including that the town’s radiation levels have been partially remediated. As a result, the town is open for some redevelopment. Construction workers move relatively easily, and residents may return to some areas on a limited basis. I wouldn’t need to pass through security checkpoints before entering an exclusion zone, although I was stopped and questioned by the police during the visit.

The newfound opening of the city did not affect much of National Route 6, which — while open — was flanked by temporary gates preventing access to houses and businesses along the road and radiation monitors. Each provided tangible reminders of the area’s invisible contamination.


CU9I4786 CU9I4779
Temporary gates and a radiation monitor along National Route 6, the Rikuzenhama Highway

CU9I4729
Bags of contaminated soil along National Route 6

Because I wasn’t with Deputy Mayor Sanpei, I was unable to revisit a portion of the town we visited in 2014, but I was able to see the majority of the town center. Arriving near the old train station, I freely moved among cleanup crews along streets once surrounded by buildings. The area had been cleared of structures, leaving only the streets, a few utility poles, and the hills to remind visitors of what was once there. An occasional dignitary would arrive accompanied by staffers only to take a few photographs with a cellphone and then duck into a waiting car. I was surprised by how the area was both empty and busy.


CU9I4862 Update
The most visible signs of tsunami damage have been removed from downtown Tomioka

CU9I4934 Update
… including the downtown Tomioka storefront with the clock stopped at the time the earthquake struck

CU9I4821 CU9I4867
Workers cleared soil while visitors snapped photographs of the obscured coastline

CU9I4856 Update
The site of the former Tomioka train station is being reworked

CU9I4927 Update
A few buildings were visible away from downtown

CU9I4898 Update
Trucks drove where buildings once stood

The concentrated nature of the cleanup effort was clear in the city’s residential neighborhoods, where the streets were near motionless. Along these streets, dereliction is rampant and there are few visible workers. The occasional building has even collapsed in on itself. Here, I regularly stopped my car in the middle of the street to stand on the sills and get a slightly elevated view of the blocks.

After 30 minutes of driving through these neighborhoods I hit the edge of the former exclusion zone and began my long return trip to Tokyo.


CU9I4957 CU9I5025
CU9I5026 CU9I5007
Four quiet Tomioka streets

CU9I4987
Derelict buildings in Tomioka

I expected that this visit would be just the second of many trips to Tōhoku, but I was surprised by how much had — and hadn’t — changed in two and a half years. Some of the modifications are masked by the tension between tangible and intangible changes, but the continued need for infrastructure development and residential cleanup makes me especially curious about the region’s future. I left Tōhoku more energized than haunted, and I can’t wait to return.

Another Year of Projects and A Little Travel

Even more than 2013, I spent 2014 working on projects, including the films Almost There and The Area, and photography series about subsidized housing in New York City and Japan’s Tōhoku region. When not working on those projects, I continued to travel through the United States, often to work on my ongoing collaboration with Michael Carriere at the Milwaukee School of Engineering. Below, I have included sample photographs from those projects, alongside supplementary images I made in many of the cities I visited throughout the year. As always, you can click through most of the photographs to view them on flickr, alongside many other everyday images.

PROJECTS

Almost There

In 2013, I produced a body of work as Environmental Cinematographer for the ITVS/Kartemquin Films project Almost There. After a year of post-production work, the film made its world premiere at DOCNYC in November. It has since screened at ArcLight Hollywood, and its Chicago premiere will be on January 10, 2015 at the Gene Siskel Film Center. Watch for it on PBS later this year.

The Area

I continue to busily work on The Area, alongside editors Brian Ashby and Peter Galassi from Scrappers Film Group. Thanks to the support from the Graham Foundation, the Driehaus Foundation, and the City of Chicago’s Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events, we produced more than three hours of edited footage last summer and are preparing for another round of editing early in 2015. Still, I am not done with the project and expect to be filming into 2015. If you are interested in reading about the project, I continue to write a column addressing some of the pertinent issues for BAG News. My next piece will be published in the next few weeks, although you can always check in at the film’s website for updates.

Demolition on Garfield

Untitled

The Subsidized Housing of New York City, New York

This fall I worked on a documentary photography project about subsidized housing in New York that included everything from historic cooperative developments to the public housing projects of the New York City Housing Authority. I will provide more details about that series when it is published as part of a book project next year. In the meantime, I’ve included two images below.

Markham Gardens Kids Walking Through Buildings

Co-op City

Japan

At the beginning of 2014 I flew to Japan for an exhibition of the Isolated Building Studies at Gallery Tanto Tempo, which led to the publication of Isolated Building Studies by UTAKATADO Publishing. Following my time in Kobe, I visited other cities before heading into Tōhoku, the Japanese region critically affected by the March 11, 2011 earthquake, tsunami, and subsequent nuclear disaster. Several photographs from the visit are below, and I wrote a lengthy summary of the experience last January.

Cars Upturned by Tsunami, Downtown Tomioka The Post-Tsunami Site of the Ogatsucho Mizuhama Town Center
Trucks Along the River Ishinomaki from Above, with Reconstruction Underway

Aoyama Kitamachi Danchi

OTHER UNITED STATES CITIES

Bay Area, California

George's Market, Haircuts Today

Buffalo, New York

In 2013, I created a small project about Buffalo’s telescope houses, and I continued to work on the project in 2014. The following set of night photographs is a sample of the material I made to extend the earlier work.

Buffalo, New York Telescope Houses at Night

Cambridge, Massachusetts

While I have been mainly using my time in Cambridge to write, I have been working on a small project about the neighborhood of Cambridgeport.

First United Mkt

Chicago, Illinois

In addition to working on The Area and a set of photographs from this year’s polar vortex, I continue to work on a broad body of work about Chicago, from general views of daily urban life to documenting specific events like the Luftwerk/Mas Context installation at Marina City.

Streetlight, In the Snow

Sleeping (on the) Job

Luftwerk's Installation at Marina City, Presented by Mas Context

Cleveland, Ohio

I am working on a typology of post-war residential buildings in the Cleveland area.

Post-War Suburban Homes

Detroit, Michigan

Although I have slowed working on my seven-year project about the Detroit, Michigan area, I still made a few trips to the city.

Ride It Sculpture Park

Los Angeles, California

Los Angeles

Milwaukee, Wisconsin

El Alfarero Iglesia Apostolica

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Suburban Minneapolis

New York City, New York

The Padded Wagon, Mayor John Purroy Mitchel Houses

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and its River Towns

I was happy to have enough time in the Pittsburgh area to produce a small project along the Monongahela and Ohio Rivers.

Residence, Mitchell Power Station

Providence, Rhode Island

Downtown Providence from the Southeast

St. Louis, Missouri

I was only in St. Louis for a couple of days, but I was excited to be able to snap this aerial image of Granite City, Illinois.

Granite City

To 2015!

Visiting Japanese Cities

The most challenging portion of my trip to Japan was the time in Tōhoku’s recovering disaster areas, but I spent the majority of my visit in urban Japan. The first half of my trip was structured around Kobe, where I was exhibiting my Isolated Building Studies, and Tokyo served as the base for the second half of the excursion. Whether in Kobe, Tokyo or Sendai, I was excited to have the opportunity to experience Japan’s distinctive urban character alongside some of the most idealistic examples of mid-century architecture — and some of the boldest contemporary styles. The following photographs feature the most typical and atypical locations.

Yaesu Buildings Akihabara Buildings
Representative buildings in the Yaesu and Akihabara districts of Tokyo

Kisho Kurokawa's Nakagin Capsule Tower Kenz? Tange's Shizuoka Press and Broadcasting Center
Kisho Kurokawa’s Nakagin Capsule Tower and Kenzō Tange’s Shizuoka Press and Broadcasting Center, both in Tokyo

Aoyama Kitamachi Danchi
Aoyama Kitamachi Danchi, a social housing development on the edge of Tokyo’s Omotesando commercial district
[Special thanks go to Luis Mendo, who walked me through this district.]

Dior Herzog & de Meuron's Prada Aoyama
SANAA’s Christian Dior Omotesando and Herzog & de Meuron’s Prada Aoyama, both in Tokyo

Harajuku Protestant Church IMG_6780_1
Ciel Rouge Création’s Harajuku Protestant Church in Tokyo and Toyo Ito’s Sendai Mediatheque in Sendai

At Night
A restaurant just beyond Tokyo Station

From the Playing Field
Looking over Kobe from the Hyogo Prefectural Kobe High School

Tokyo Vending Machines Kobe Vending Machine Vending Machines
Ubiquitous vending machines in Tokyo, Kobe and Tokyo, respectively

Along the Street
A typical commercial street near downtown Kobe

Tokyo Street
A typical mixed-use street near Tokyo’s famous Omotesando shopping district

After the Japanese Disaster and into the Fukushima Exclusion Zone

Last week I traveled with Japanese advertising director and photographer Yohei Morita through Tōhoku, the Japanese region critically affected by the March 11, 2011 earthquake, tsunami, and subsequent nuclear disaster.

Tōhoku is wedged between the Sea of Japan and the Pacific Ocean on the northern portion of the country’s largest island, Honshu. Compared to southern Honshu and its major cities, the region is rural and less habitable, even along the coastlines. The island’s volcanic and tectonic history are clear there, where the coastal hills make way for the Ōu Mountains and its national parks, hot springs and temples, including the famous Yama-dera temple complex that dates back to the ninth century.

Yama-dera Temple Complex
Yama-dera

The landscape that makes the coastal regions of Tōhoku so lovely amplified the disaster. While most of the region escaped unscathed, along the eastern section of the coast, the mountains and hills make way for the dozens of small bays and river valleys that became the locations of small towns. For hundreds of years, residents of these towns lived side-by-side with their rice paddies and fishing fleet harbors, and the hills above were the locations of shrines and timber harvesting. When the tsunami struck, it rose as high as 130 feet, immediately overwhelming many eastern coastal harbors and surging up the rivers, which jumped their banks and flood-walls. Whole towns were nearly destroyed. The Japanese government estimates that more than 18,000 people lost their lives, and another 340,000 were displaced.

Building on its Side
Building on its Side, Onagawa

Towns and business that were farther inland quickly became safe harbors for the residents who survived. Among others is Oiwake Onsen, a traditional spring inn near the nearly submerged town of Onagawa, which became the home for two dozen elderly town residents. They lived in the inn for nearly six months while the cleanup and rebuilding occurred.

IMG_7209 Onsen
Oiwake Onsen

Nearly three years since the disaster, many of these towns have been cleared of most debris and now resemble fallow fields. Where new buildings do dot the landscape, they are typically prefabricated structures or even converted shipping containers. While driving along the coastal roads, we would often emerge from the hills to find a cemetery on the edge of the field. It replaced the town. Survivors have also constructed shrines near the disaster sites, including the Okawa primary school where 74 children and 10 teachers perished when the surge breached the river banks 30 minutes after the earthquake.

Ogatsucho Mizuhama
Ogatsucho Mizuhama

Ishinomaki by the Ocean
The Coast of Ishinomaki

Cemetery Along the Kitakami River
Cemetery Along the Kitakami River

Christmas Tree and Memorial, Ogatsucho Kamiogatsu
Christmas Tree and Memorial, Ogatsucho Kamiogatsu

Okawa Elementary School and Temporary Memorial
Temporary Memorial Outside Okawa Elementary School

Few of those residents who survived the disaster have returned home. Some live in nearby resettlement camps that are safely placed in the hills. Many have left the rural areas for regional cities like Sendai City or Ishinomaki, but others have left for Japan’s metropolises, including Tokyo and Kobe.

Resettlement Housing
New 23 Unit Housing Complex Outside Onagawa

Instead of houses, construction work fills the area. Whole fleets of trucks are at work removing debris and moving the earth to fortify embankments, build roads and prepare other kinds of infrastructure. This construction work provides one new source of regional employment, including for unskilled labor like the sweepers that flank each site. Rebuilt fishing harbors are being put to limited use, and timber and oyster production is scaling up. Tourism is even increasing in the region, like at the Zuiganji temple and the nearby Matsushima Bay. Still, even major towns like Ishinomaki — which celebrated removing all disaster debris on the day we arrived — are suffering from economic conditions beyond the direct effects of the tsunami and earthquake.


Trucks Along the River
Trucks Waiting for a Stoplight Along the Kitakami River

Rebuilding a Road and River Barrier
Rebuilding a Road and Kitakami River Barrier

IMG_7287_8 Shellfish Production
Lumber and Shellfish Production in Miyagi Prefecture

Quiet Arcade Street in Ishinomaki
Quiet Arcade Street in Ishinomaki

Ishinomaki
Ishinomaki from Above, with Reconstruction Underway

Zuiganji Temple
Zuiganji Temple Grounds

Despite all of this activity, one area remains nearly as it was on the day of the earthquake: the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant exclusion zone. One of two nuclear power plants along the Fukushima Prefecture coastline, the Fukushima Daiichi plant was compromised by the tsunami and suffered catastrophic failures over the following few days. The explosions and other problems led to the release of radioactive material into the air and ocean. The Japanese government instituted a mandatory evacuation for residents in a 20km and then 30km radius; however, the evacuation zones were initially designed to protect against contamination from an explosion, rather than the distribution of radioactive material through wind and other weather patterns. The result was many residents were exposed to radioactivity despite the government response. Those in the areas to the northwest of the plant — even those outside of the exclusion zone — suffered the highest contamination, although radioactive hotspots are located over northern and central Honshu, including in Tokyo. Still, the government is quick to point out that the amount of radiation released was considerably less than that at Chernobyl, and scientists currently anticipate only slight increases in cancer rates among most of those exposed. We can hope.

Today, several towns within the exclusion zone remain evacuated. They are primarily frozen in time, ghost towns that — until very recently — were left as they were three years earlier. Emergency crews are removing radioactive material and have removed some debris from the streets, but nearly everything else is as it was on the day of the disaster. Cars are upturned, houses are open and plants sprout everywhere.

Thanks to Deputy Mayor Hirofumi Sanpei, we visited the small town of Tomioka that sits on the edge of the exclusion zone and is still closed to the general public. It had a population of more than 16,000 before the disaster and is located next to the other nuclear power plant in the region, the Fukushima Daini Nuclear Power Plant. Just beyond its boundaries is the former J-Village national soccer complex that is the major staging area for the recovery effort.


Deputy Mayor Hirofumi Sanpei
Deputy Mayor Hirofumi Sanpei Indicates Where We Will Travel

Upturned Cars, Downtown Tomioka
Upturned Cars, Downtown Tomioka

Downtown Tomioka
Downtown Tomioka Street

Shop Window
Downtown Tomioka Shop Window

Downtown Tomioka
Downtown Tomioka Street

Downtown Tomioka Shop
Downtown Tomioka Shop, Clock Stopped at the Time the Earthquake Struck: 2:46pm

Memorial Flowers
Memorial Flowers by the Main Tomioka Train Station

The town itself remains blanketed in low levels of radiation. Official radiation monitors are exclamation points in the landscape, announcing the immediate radioactivity readings in microsieverts (μSv) per hour. The areas we visited ranged between 0.07 μSv in the mountains to 4.5 μSv near one of the town’s former train stations. My personal monitor was generally between 0.2 μSv and 0.7 μSv. [For more data about radiation in the Fukushima disaster area, visit Safe Cast or this national map display.]

To put the readings into perspective, the United States Environmental Protection Agency estimates that a chest x-ray contains between 20-50 μSv, and radiation exposure on a cross-country flight is as much as 50 μSv. In other words, I experienced more radiation during my flight to Japan than in the few hours I was in the exclusion zone, although the kinds of radiation I experienced near Fukushima were more likely to be absorbed. To reduce the amount of absorption, I wore some protective clothing, a mask to avoid inhaling contaminated dust on a windy day, and shoe coverings, which were provided by and tested for radioactivity by Tokyo Electric Power Co. when we left the region. They were “clean.”


Radioactivity Monitor, Closed Section of Tomioka
Radioactivity Monitor in Tomioka Reading 4.119μSv per hour

While the general public is not permitted to access the town, most residents have been recently allowed to return to survey damage to their property, although they are not permitted to move back into their homes. The delay is partly caused by the radiation and partly caused by infrastructure problems. The result is that most of the town remains eerily quiet, even though a massive recovery effort is underway.

The most visible signs of the recovery effort are the construction vehicles on the main roads, the large piles of bags of contaminated soil, and the white plastic of temporary roof repairs. Still, some areas of higher contamination are off-limits even to the town’s residents. The blockades are visible on GPS systems, and officers working road checkpoints require official government permission to enter. Beyond these areas, the evidence of the earthquake is clearer and few repairs have occurred.

Roadblocks on GPS Roadblock in Tomioka
Roadblocks in Tomioka

Workers, Tomioka
Workers, Truck Moving Soil in Tomioka

Abandoned Yonomori Train Station
Abandoned Yonomori Train Station in Tomioka’s Heightened Exclusion Zone

Street in the Heightened Exclusion Zone
Street in Tomioka’s Heightened Exclusion Zone

Bagged Radioactive Debris
Bagged Radioactive Debris Outside of Tomioka

After we left the area, we headed into the mountains to the village of Kawauchi. The village was affected by the earthquake but was the immediate destination for Tomioka residents fleeing the tsunami. As many as 6,000 residents jammed the scenic mountain road and tunnels that lead to the town and were then housed in schools and other sites. All were then evacuated from Kawauchi when the nuclear evacuation order was executed.

Significantly fewer residents live in the town since the evacuation order was lifted on April 1, 2012. Two of the three elementary schools have closed, and only a handful of students remain in each grade. The radiation levels in the town were the lowest we experienced in the region, at only 0.07 μSv. Area residents are tentatively optimistic about the area’s long-term prospects, but the future is unclear for this town and many others in the region.


Kawauchi Street
A Kawauchi Main Street

Kawauchi Elementary School Class
Kawauchi Elementary School Class

The entire eastern coast is working its way to recovery, but it will take generations assess the total cost of the great Tōhoku disaster. Officials continue to grapple with containment issues at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, and residents and government agents continue to scale up the recovery effort. At present, the government estimates it will re-open Tomioka by 2017, although there are questions about who will return. Nuclear energy and tsunami and earthquake preparedness are being discussed around the country, where even the Tokyo governor race is becoming a de facto referendum on the government nuclear response. Japan’s nuclear future may hang in the balance.

Special thanks go to Yohei Morita and Tomioka Deputy Mayor Hirofumi Sanpei, whose assistance was essential to producing this essay.