The buildings that lined Ginza had signs posted everywhere, and crows flew between them

Crow flying over the streets of Ginza — Crow flying over Ginza

The streets of Ginza, Tokyo were flanked by tall buildings, and the buildings were covered with many signboards. When I see such a scene, I feel it is very Asian. Although there are large electronic billboards advertising Piccadilly Circus in London and Times Square in New York, basically in America and Europe, there are no signboards everywhere in town like in Asia. This is because in the U.S. and Europe, there are regulations in place to protect the landscape as common property.

Because they are regulated as part of urban planning, there is a sense of unity in the townscape in Europe and America. In Japan, too, there is a law called the Outdoor Advertising Law and local government ordinances, but the regulations are more lenient than in Europe and the United States. As a result, the streets of Japan are filled with billboards everywhere.

Considering that in Europe and the U.S., townscapes with a sense of unity and almost no signboards have become a tourist resource, why doesn't Japan go the other way? Imitating them is not interesting. Even if people put up signs on the walls in the same way as before, if people had a unique townscape with, for example, signs with eyeballs written on them like in Tsuge Yoshiharu's Screw Style, many people would come to see it. I would probably go there with my camera in hand.

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