Protesters demand that Japan save trees by revising design plan for popular Tokyo park

Lining up, holding hands in front of some trees won’t accomplish anything. You need to make it uncomfortable for Keiko and the developers. Protest outside their offices, follow them around and your displeasure known. Make some noise!

It's almost criminal to cut down 3000 trees in Tokyo, one of the desist population zones on earth.

Good luck protesting against the corporate world though....agree with commentator above, action should embarrass the big wigs behind this decision to cull trees.

Certainly cant claim any high ground as an Australian in this debate...our record in deforestation is appalling.

Recently the city of Sydney removed 100 year old Moreton Bay fig trees lining a road that were planted to commemorate the sacrifice of diggers {Aussie soldiers } in WW1.

Widening the road for a new tram line was the reason.

Embarrassed to be a human sometimes.

They recently razed half a park near my house to make way for a new road that was planned decades ago and, with a declining population and car ownership in our area, isn’t needed. Its drastically reduced the number of trees in our area and just made it a grayer, bleaker place. I 100% support these protesters.

Truly awful that such a lovely, and historic, area of greenery should be destroyed to make way for yet more buildings. Tokyo has enough buildings; we really don't need any more.

Tokyo Gov. Yuriko Koike approved the plan in February

I remember Koike saying she would address the issue of Tokyo being a heat island during her election campaign. This is the exact opposite.

Let’s see the common person versus Mitsubishi…….

That this is even an issue in 2023 is shameful.

What an absolutely insane, and immoral decision. To totally erase 3,000 trees in Japans capital city, which is already awash with high rises etc...is being done for money and profit, no other reason. I am sure there must be a 100 or more places to build on if they are really necessary.....which I honestly doubt. Property developers and builders and designers, not forgetting local officials, will all gain from this scheme. But the people, no, they do not matter.

Trees are ornaments of earth and main source of oxygen

"densest population zones " I meant.

"Desist " in removing the trees

Time to say no to developers and more concrete. These guys get my full support, even if they ultimately lose! Great to see Japanese protesting and bucking th stereotype of being a robot. (Well some of them who actually care).

What an atrocious decision. Criminal. Check the people who allowed its bank accounts.

Trees are the lungs of the earth. They provide shelter for animals, a habitat, shade and respite from concrete. They lift our spirits through the four seasons.

May these protestors increase and make their views loud and clear to the authorities. As the environment heats up, mother earth is crying out for our help.

Depressing, behind my house there was a big edo-taisho samurai clan villa with a city block worth of greenery. The garden had 130 types of plants, they were all cut down and the historical buildings demolished and now we wait for a massive ugly condo to be built. My house was extremely hot and difficult to cool this year because all the shade from the trees has now disappeared. I hope the protesters succeed, but i doubt they will since money easily corrupts.

Just like the Americans, the Japanese are owned and controlled by their big domestic corporations. Their passive, polite nature is walked upon by the likes of Mitsubishi Estate, Mitsui, Sumitomo, Hulic, Nomura, etc. The gov't is 100% on board with the arrangement and does nothing but pay lipservice to these injustices. Cutting down thousands of trees in a city with a severe lack of green spaces, only to put more concrete, steel and pavement... and the gov't wants people to care about climate change or their "green agenda"? What a joke. Tokyo is less and less interesting every year since I've been living there in the early 2000s. I now only view it as a place of work and have no intention to live there with my family. I will choose somewhere far away that is greener for them to live.

Seems like sacrilege that the urban- planners can even be considering the loss of such a valuable amenity, a small green sanctuary in the concrete-jungle. It's one of my favourite cut-through walks down to Shinjuku Gyoen.

Koike should take a trip to London to see how they preserve the green environments of their parks and opens spaces there, she would learn a lot - these places are the living, breathing lungs of a great city.

Trees aside, how are they able to take a public park and allow come private company to build an office building there?

MADNESS! That park is not only visited by hundreds of thousands of Japanese year after year but tourists from around the world.

Not only that, but those trees are also desperately needed with Japan heating up year after year. Japan should be leading the way not to destroy the earth for another concrete building and or arena when he has plenty of both in this country but instead promote the need to save precious trees like the ones they are permitting to be destroyed.

I too am only a foreigner; however, I do love this country and because I love this country, I am going to speak up in support of all these people who took the time to make a stance which is rare.

A place for the people to hang around and enjoy themselves without spending a single-yen ? RAZE IT!

Tokyo Gov. Yuriko Koike approved the plan in February, a move that would allow developers — real estate company Mitsui Fudosan, Meiji Jingu shrine, Itochu Corp. and the ministry-affiliate Japan Sports Council — to build a pair of 200-meter (650-foot) skyscrapers and an 80-meter (260-foot) tower.

These are the culprits who do not give a S... about the people and the benefits of having these trees in Tokyo. What they want is money, and the more the better, and I wonder if the govenor is in on that too.......any bets?

Once trees are cut in cities, they are never replaced, the concrete stays.

As a non-Japanese, nothing I can do

You can send a letter to the Tokyo government to protest. If you are a fiscal resident, you have the right to know how your taxes are used and send your opinion. It might not be taken into account for sure, but if it is well written in Japanese, someone will look at

Cutting down 3000 Mature Trees in Tokio?

No! NO !! NO !!! NO !!!! NO !!!!! NO !!!!!! NO!!!!!!!! NO!!!!!!!! NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

NO Are there no more Japanese people in Japan?

Zero Comments? Why? Where are the readers of Japan today? ALL readers not only in Japan should protest against the slaughter of trees. I, a foreigner am helping to start the ball rolling. Trees make us healthy. It is a crime to murder a tree.

As a non-Japanese, nothing I can do.

Transplant them to another place...

Goodo lucku

by revising its plan to redevelop a popular downtown park.

Gaien Jingu is not really downtown is it?

That would require cutting down nearly 3,000 trees at Jingu Gaien,

The plan is to plant 5000 trees so there’s a net gain of 2000 trees.

The land of SDGs-pin wearing salarymen is really taking a massive L on environmental issues.

Maybe if they cut all the trees down in Tokyo people will wake up and go move back out into the heartland to raise families there. That would save the country.

That protest will have no effect, those area will be filled with skyscraper .