NISEKO
Taro Tamai’s Ideal Line: Balancing Growth in Niseko
“It’s kind of like Shibuya in town now,” Domi Churiki said.
We were standing in an icy parking lot in Niseko. It was midafternoon in late January in the marquis resort town on the island of Hokkaido, Japan, and it was getting more crowded by the minute.
Domi was partly joking. He was referring to Tokyo’s famous Shibuya intersection, the busiest pedestrian crossing in the world. Here, there weren’t any 4-second cars or giant LCD screens, but the checkout line at the 7-Eleven wound through the aisles and nearly out the front door. The wide lower slopes of Niseko Grand Hirafu were visibly clogged with folks funneling down to the village for après. It was a spectacle of stretched capacity, but no different than any popular resort stateside during peak season.
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