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AROUND THE TRAIN STATION:Welcome visitors into a World Heritage city with landscaped areas for strolling, shopping malls of upscale Japanese items.
Develop an 1890's electric trolley system connecting the 3 major temples near the station and the riverfront. This could start as a motorized trolley.
Put electric wires on major streets of the area underground.
Plant more trees, especially cherry and maples.
ALONG THE RIVER:
Looking to Paris and Seville as models, make the rivebanks tourist-friendly with trees, places to eat, events, many benches for people-watching, etc.
Develop a scenic walkway between the train bridges and Gion.
Build one or more dams for enought water depth to allow small pleasure boats on the river.
CONNECT THE TEMPLE AREAS with walkways reminiscent of old Kyoto:
For examples, use the "philosopher's walk" or the attractive low buildings between Taizoin temple and Shunkoin temple.
Encourage shops and small restaurants along the walkways, but insist they be in traditional style buildings - as on the 'Higashiyama Path' area around the Yasaka pagoda.
Editorial in The Japan Times of Sept. 23, 2007:
"Beautifying Kyoto, at last. In early September, the Kyoto city government began enforcing regulations against ugliness in the city. Yes, ugliness. The mayor of Kyoto, Yorikane Masumoto, and his municipal government found the political will to think beyond the immediate concerns of day-to-day business demands, and to consider how Kyoto, once one of the world's most beautiful cities, could look a lot better.
"Part of the need for beautifying is the realization that Kyoto's future, and Japan's as well, may well depend upon tourism. No one goes to Kyoto to shop at discount stores, stare at tangled wires or photograph concrete high-rises. They go for tea ceremonies, kaiseki meals, traditional shops and long walks along pretty streets. When the 'borrowed scenery' behind the walls of Kyoto's magnificent temple gardens consists of unsightly apartment blocks and objectionable office buildings, the flavor of the whole city is diluted. World tourism numbers show that few people travel to ugly places."
page by Van Sloan of USA. Click for information on him.
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