Tokiwabashi Apartment (July 1933)
[The legendary Tokiwabashi Apartment in front of Tokyo Station]

Many unbuilt volume check plans remain among the old drawings. Among them, the most unusual are plans for housing around Tokyo Station. As early as the Meiji period, there are the No. 6 and No. 7 buildings (completed in 1904), which were originally planned as offices and residences, and the building layout plan for the south-central part of Marunouchi (1899), which shows a row of small houses lined up south of Babasaki-dori Street.

This time, we will introduce the "Tokiwabashi Apartments" plan from 1933. The planned site is part of the Tokiwabashi block currently under development. Looking at the "first floor plan," it is noted that the Gofukubashi Pump Station (formerly the Zenibin Pump Station, completed in 1931) is marked on the south side of the planned site. The apartment types depicted on the floor plans for each floor are either a living room, kitchen, bedroom and bathroom, or bedroom only. In addition to a shared entrance and shoe room, a dining room, social room and recreation room are also planned, making it a plan that could also be used as a modern company dormitory.

However, just around the corner from the living room was the Gofukubashi Pumping Station, a sewage treatment facility. It was hard to say that this was a suitable living environment for a prime location in front of Tokyo Station. The surrounding area was lined with dilapidated wooden offices and houses, and in the wake of the Great Kanto Earthquake, there was a growing trend to "build homes in the suburbs."

Why on earth was the Tokiwabashi Apartment being considered at this time? Was it the fervent wish of our great predecessors who had always dreamed of one day realizing housing in front of Tokyo Station?

29 years later, the Tokiwabashi district redevelopment project, which was carried out in parallel with the Marunouchi Comprehensive Renovation Plan, began as the Tokiwabashi Disaster Prevention Building Block Development Project. In 1965, the Nippon Building, the largest building in the Orient at the time, was born.
Once again, the housing around Tokyo Station became a mirage.