I find that a bit funny given that in the last 15 years or so Japan has officially done a lot to attract tourists. Wanting to become a tourist destination, branding themselves as a place for holidays. I’ve seen so many “Visit Japan” campaigns, usually sponsored by the Japanese government, in the last decade or so.
I get that it sucks for the people living in those cities and good for them that their city council does something to help, it still feels weird after years and years of campaigns to attract more tourists to Japan.
I think they should keep up the tourism campaigns, but they need to focus them on areas other than Kansai and Tokyo.
There’s so many great place all over Japan, but of course most flights are into Kansai or Narita airport, so naturally people are going to look for attractions and accommodation nearby. There are many international airports, but they are of course only available from closer east Asian Countries, but that does make up the bulk of the tourist population (half of all tourists are from China, Korea or Taiwan), so advertising those cities heavily would be a good start - “Come to Miyajima, we don’t speak Mandarin, but we’ve got 50 varieties of mandarins!”
A big issue in my view is the increase in cost of the JR rail pass and the price of and difficulty to navigate shinkansen in general. A cool campaign would be a free/cheap train ticket from Tokyo to the north, or Osaka to the west included with your international plane ticket.
Also, I believe Chinese driving licenses aren’t valid in Japan, because of the IDP requirement - if the biggest tourist demographic could hire cars and go off the beaten track, that might distribute the crowds a bit.
I find that a bit funny given that in the last 15 years or so Japan has officially done a lot to attract tourists. Wanting to become a tourist destination, branding themselves as a place for holidays. I’ve seen so many “Visit Japan” campaigns, usually sponsored by the Japanese government, in the last decade or so. I get that it sucks for the people living in those cities and good for them that their city council does something to help, it still feels weird after years and years of campaigns to attract more tourists to Japan.
I think they should keep up the tourism campaigns, but they need to focus them on areas other than Kansai and Tokyo.
There’s so many great place all over Japan, but of course most flights are into Kansai or Narita airport, so naturally people are going to look for attractions and accommodation nearby. There are many international airports, but they are of course only available from closer east Asian Countries, but that does make up the bulk of the tourist population (half of all tourists are from China, Korea or Taiwan), so advertising those cities heavily would be a good start - “Come to Miyajima, we don’t speak Mandarin, but we’ve got 50 varieties of mandarins!”
A big issue in my view is the increase in cost of the JR rail pass and the price of and difficulty to navigate shinkansen in general. A cool campaign would be a free/cheap train ticket from Tokyo to the north, or Osaka to the west included with your international plane ticket.
Also, I believe Chinese driving licenses aren’t valid in Japan, because of the IDP requirement - if the biggest tourist demographic could hire cars and go off the beaten track, that might distribute the crowds a bit.