Browse > Home / Real Estate / Tokyo Tatemono wins bid to develop Tokyo’s next huge mixed-use real estate project…in Nakano!

Tokyo Tatemono wins bid to develop Tokyo’s next huge mixed-use real estate project…in Nakano!

June 30, 2007
By Ken Worsley


Apparently, Tokyo Tatemono has submitted the winning 143.7 billion yen ($1.16 billion) bid to acquire the grounds of the former “police academy” in Tokyo’s Nakano Ward from the Ministry of Finance.

First, it’s interesting that Bloomberg refers to the site in English as a former police academy, when Japanese sources name it (more) properly as 「旧陸軍中野学 」 - the former Nakano War School. 陸軍, of course, refers to the former 陸軍省, or Ministry of War, which was abolished at the end of World War 2. I’ll let the Nakano buffs in the audience explain what the site was used for more properly…I’ll stick to wondering why the English-language press releases have sanitized the name (and former role) of the location.

Back to Tokyo Tatemono. The company apparently plans to build an office, residential and and commercial complex on the site, which sounds like another multi-use development. This continues a trend that has been going on for some time now in Tokyo, though this project seems a bit different; it lies outside of the circle of the Yamanote Line, which tends to demarcate “downtown” Tokyo from the more residential areas. This is why I find Nakano to be a curious choice of location for such a development. Nothing against Nakano…

The price struck me as well. Bloomberg quotes Daisuke Fukushima, a real estate analyst at Nomura Securities, as saying:

My first impression is that this is a very expensive price. But whether it’s really expensive will depend on how many floors Tokyo Tatemono can build and the condition of the market when they sell.

Not to mention, how much can the retailers get away with overpricing knick-knacks and individually wrapped cookies, which they’re doing very well with over at Midtown.

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Comments

8 Responses to “Tokyo Tatemono wins bid to develop Tokyo’s next huge mixed-use real estate project…in Nakano!”

  1. John S on July 1st, 2007 1:15 am

    That’s just for the land, right? How much did the Roppongi Hills/Midtown spots go for?

  2. Joe on July 1st, 2007 6:18 pm

    You can see the property right here:

    http://maps.google.co.jp/?ie=UTF8&ll=35.707562,139.662387&spn=0.008886,0.01502&t=h&z=16&om=1

    It was being used as a police academy according to my maps of Tokyo from 1-2 years ago. Lots of former War Ministry property around the city. If you ever see someone selling vintage maps of the city in Tokyo Station or Ginza, get one from the 30’s and take a look at it. Yoyogi Park, much of Roppongi, etc. was all used by the military before 1945 (and much of it was taken over by the US armed forces afterwards).

    Nakano is not that surprising. Oshiage is also outside the Yamanote, and it’s getting some major development right now with the Sumida Tower and surrounding commercial complex. Not to mention the Saitama-Shintoshin before either of these things. The more urban centers, the merrier, as far as I’m concerned.

  3. Ken Worsley on July 1st, 2007 6:51 pm

    Joe, good point about Oshiage. The entire Denentoshi/Hanzomon/Isesaki line connection is seeing massive development booms, especially on the Tokyu/Tobu parts of the lines, with residential rises going up all over.

    I’ve always advocated breaking the Chiyoda/Minato/Chou/Shibuya/Shinjuku strangehold on business property development and getting companies to move outside those five wards, though what we’ve been seeing recently hasn’t been encouraging - with the Urban Renaissance Headquarters looking to build a massive new complex in Chiyoda and potentially offering tax breaks for that area, which does nothing to help disperse the already-crowded center of the city.

  4. Jazzy on July 2nd, 2007 2:57 am

    Would that be the site of the old spy school?

  5. Durf on July 4th, 2007 2:12 pm

    Nakano is far more accessible than Odaiba, which has seen a bit of development in recent years.

  6. Ken Worsley on July 4th, 2007 2:33 pm

    Odaiba has a mixed-used RE development? Where?

  7. Garrett on July 11th, 2007 12:11 am

    That is the old spy school. Turned high school. Turned police school. Turned beloved “Green Space.” It’s rather derelict. For a time, there was a movemement to save it, at least partially on the grounds that Nakano, being Jpan’s most densely populated neighborhood, has insufficient open space for evacuation in th event of the big one.

    That motion failed, despite an informal referendum in which Nakano residents opposed selling the Green Space.

  8. Ken Worsley on July 11th, 2007 2:15 pm

    Garrett, you got it…the site of the old spy school. I thought you’d have it sooner. Jazzy asked, but I’m not sure if that technically counts.

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