There were a couple of reasons why I choose to visit these un-touristy areas. (1) Due to my interest in railway plus property urban planning and development, I wanted to see what the areas along the Hankyu Railway lines looked like since Hankyu Railway was considered a pioneer of this urban development model in Japan. (2) Since the Hankyu lines went through Takarazuka, I could also make a visit to the Osamu Tezuka Manga Museum on the way. (3) Because of the New Years, Hankyu was selling its 1 day unlimited pass as the "New Year Ticket" for only 1000 yen (US$10) compared to the normal price of 1200 yen (US$12).
The Osamu Tezuka Manga Museum in Takarazuka.
The cities of Takarazuka, Nishinomiya and Ashiya are located between Osaka and Kobe.
View 2012-01-02 Takarazuka, Nishinomiya, Ashiya in a larger map
The New Year Ticket from Hankyu and the Osamu Tezuka Manga Museum ticket.
My first destination from my hotel in Osaka was Takarazuka. When Hankyu Railway opened its Takarazuka Line almost a century ago in 1910, it had trouble attracting enough passengers to make it financially viable, so it decided to pursue real estate development along the line and to make the terminus station at the time, Takarazuka, into a major tourism spot. As a result Hankyu Railway established Takarazuka Revue, all-female musical theatre troupe with its main theatre based in Takarazuka.
This was the first implementation in Japan of the so-called railway and property development model that one can clearly see if one lives in Tokyo for a while. Because of that, I wanted to see how the urban development along the Hankyu areas compared to the Tokyo ones.
Arrival at the Hankyu Takarazuka station. It felt like an upper, middle class area complete with its own Hankyu Department Store built inside the station.
Walking around Takarazuka, there were many "non-cheap" looking apartment buildings all around. None of them looked like the non-descript danchi buildings that you see in many of the new towns surrounding all the major cities of Japan.
There was a nice tree-lined pathway to the Takarazuka Revue Grand Theatre.
The Takarazuka Revue Grand Theatre. Although it also has a theatre in Tokyo, this is the main one.
Bust of Hankyu Railway founder, Ichizō Kobayashi.
Next, I visited the Osamu Tezuka Manga Museum, best known as the person who drew Astro Boy. The museum is located near the Takarazuka Revue Grand Theatre and is actually quite small.
At the museum, I also saw a short animation produced just for the museum.
Sketches and other artifacts.
Upstairs was a manga library with all the works produced by Osamu Tezuka.
After spending some time at the museum, I walked around Takarazuka and headed for the station to explore the next destination.
Next I headed to Nishinomiya because I had to change trains. While I was there, I saw a large commercial development known as Nishinomiya Gardens. Apparently, the site was a former baseball stadium that was no longer in use and was now developed into an impressive looking shopping centre. Too bad I did not take any good pictures of the development...
Rooftop gardens on the shopping centre. It looked much more impressive in person.
My final destination before the sunset was Ashiya. Ashiya is known as a high end residential area where many celebrities live and I wanted to see how a high end residential are in the Kansai area compared to that of Tokyo.
Compared to Osaka and Kobe, the area was not really dense and featured a lot of greenery, something that is sorely missing in Osaka.
While it was interesting to walk around, there was nothing of interest to take photos of, except for the one stream/canal that ran through the low density high end residential area.
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