Fish market relocation delay likely to affect Tokyo Olympics

Universal Studios in Osaka also experienced sub-surface pollution, built on land previously owned by Sumitomo Metal, who had dumped around 700,000 tons of heavy metals in the area; a pharma research lab near Kyoto also experienced delays in building due to arsenic pollution in the soil, remnants of the Japan Army's wartime treatment of VD.

For a country that prides itself on cleanliness indoors, there is surely a lot of dirt outdoors, classic not in my back yard syndrome here.

Why would anyone approve a poison-filled site for a market in the first place? Something definitely smells "fishy".

Why don't they just revamp the old place? Seems much cheaper.

Ah but @GW, are you assuming some sort of logical thought or planning had taken place?

Shame on you if that is indeed fact.

The people 'originally in charge' saw an nice empty space on a map.

"Put it here," they decreed!

True to JSociety, their word was law.

The idiots who even considered the Toyosu site as a candidate need to be arrested & prosecuted, along with those that approved the site, this stuff is way way beyond criminal

Kleptocracy rules.

japan has become the laughingstock of the world. i can't wait to see what more will be dug up as we aporach 2020

Really? Your opinion not withstanding here, please feel free to share here the reports or stories that support your opinion.

In fact I do believe the world looks a Koike san with a sense of respect and admiration, taking on her own party, the LDP, thumbing her nose at them, going alone with no support from them, winning the election and following through on her promises to open things up and protect the people of Tokyo from the cronyism that plagued it for a generation.

It's asinine to even think that her predecessors had no idea wtf was going on, and she is doing a great job at showing the world just who is to blame for the cluster-fruck and no one, outside of the LDP is going to blame her for doing what is right!

Yes they didn't mention the cyanide.

At least Koike is looking into it or else nothing would be happening. They might be able to recover some money due to negligence and fraud who knows.

The road from 25 minutes to 10 is nice but hardly a real concern if roads are closed at certain times to allow the transit of athletes. It's not a correct planning assumption to consider everything staying the same in Tokyo while the Olympics are going on. That may be okay at the Pan Am scale but not at the Olympic scale. Closing roads at certain times of day or dedicated lanes would mitigate this fine enough

Maybe a monstrosity like Tokyo isn't the best choice to host a land hungry event like the Olympics?

Was the other pollutant,amongst others cyanide?

Really giving Rio a run for its fiasco money.

"Tokyo was forced to scrap the first stadium design because it was too expensive"..... who comes up with this stuff? No-one forced anyone.

I recently saw JLand dropped in ranking for global competitiveness. For me, both that story and this have one common connection.

“If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail!” ― Benjamin Franklin

Planning, it seems, is never considered. This only leads to the YUGE waste of time, effort, and money that is seen in daily life.

Awareness of issues such as murcury and PCB/plastic contamination of the ocean food chain

would present an existential threat to Japan's economy and the sense of being Japanese.

@ifd66

Doesn't make sense. If awareness is low, people are going to buy anyway, no?

"People worried about contamination won’t buy fish"

Yes, they will, and they do so everyday. Awareness of issues such as murcury and PCB/plastic contamination of the ocean foodchain is low here. Yet tuna, at the top of the food chain, is still a firm favourite.

Good old Japan. At least Koike isn't let it go forward simply to avoid embarrassment, and is doing the right thing.