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Meiji-Era Sewers Still Work Beneath ChinatownJapan’s modern sewer system began in Yokohama’s foreign settlement

Brick sewer pipes laid in the Meiji era are said to be still in use under parts of Minamimon Silk Road. Japan’s first modern sewers were built in Yokohama’s foreign settlement, which included today’s Chinatown.

A Meiji sewer pipe you can see

South of Chikyumon gate along Chōandō street, a large brick sewer pipe stands beside the entrance of the city’s Naka civil engineering office. It was dug up in Yamashita-cho in 1981 and dates from the Meiji era.

Some pipes from that time are said to be still in use around Minamimon Silk Road.

Ceramic pipes in 1869

A few years after the port opened, the foreign settlement grew fast. In 1869 the British engineer Richard Brunton, hired by the Meiji government, planned an underground sewer of ceramic pipes.

Pipes ran under the middle of the roads at a gentle slope and drained to the sea at seven points. Gutters lined both sides of each street, with drains about every 60 m. The system, about 6.5 km long, took two years to build.

Key point Until then, Japanese drainage relied on open ditches and cesspits. Burying the pipes underground is regarded as the start of modern sewerage in Japan, and it began in the foreign settlements of Yokohama and Kobe.

Egg-shaped brick sewers

Within ten years the system was too small. The settlement’s population, about 1,000 at first, reached 3,937 by 1880, and cholera was spreading nationwide. A major rebuild ran for six years from 1881.

The Japanese engineer Mita Zentaro used brick pipes shaped like an upside-down egg, which keep water flowing fast even when it is shallow, so waste does not settle. In Chinatown, pipes about 76 cm tall and 42 cm wide were laid under Minamimon Silk Road and Ichiba-dori, and these are the ones said to be still working.

Manholes that trapped odors

Manhole remains found in 2001 revealed clever details. Boxes of charcoal inside filtered sewer odors before air escaped, and S-shaped bends held water to stop smells rising from house drains, the same trap used in household plumbing today.

The first public toilets

Yokohama is also said to be where public toilets began. Foreign residents objected to people urinating in the street, and in 1871 the town set up 83 board-walled toilets at street corners.

Behind Kagacho police station in Chinatown, the public toilet Sensutei, designed after Suzhou houses, won a Yokohama design award in 1998.

Next time you visit Walk south from Chikyumon gate along Chōandō and look for the Meiji brick sewer pipe beside the civil engineering office.

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