Word: underground
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Neither project has received an official go-ahead, but the Japanese government has set up task forces in several ministries to think about underground cities. Says Nobuhiko Sato, a high-ranking planner at the Construction Ministry: "The time has come to consider urban planning from the vertical viewpoint. Underground development has a great and realistic potential for alleviating congestion...
...Japanese companies say they have the technology to build extensive subterranean projects without disturbing the people aboveground. The Tokyo Electric company already has a high-voltage power station right below a Buddhist temple. Engineers are confident that they can create enormous underground structures with little danger of cave-ins. They point to such construction breakthroughs as the 33.5-mile-long Seikan Tunnel, the world's longest underwater corridor, which connects Japan's main island of Honshu with Hokkaido to the north...
Nonetheless, serious questions remain. Though Japanese cities already have underground shopping malls and parking garages, their depth and size have been strictly limited by law. The reason: a devastating fire in an underground shopping mall in Shizuoka that killed 15 people in 1980. Subterranean structures are resistant to earthquakes and water leaks but generally vulnerable to fire and smoke. Architects believe they can beat the problem with sophisticated sensor systems to warn of fires and temporary shelters in which the inside air pressure is kept slightly higher than normal to repel smoke...
...biggest obstacle could be the psychological barrier to living away from the sun and sky. Critics see the potential for mass claustrophobia. For that reason, planners foresee few underground housing projects, at least initially. The idea is to move offices and stores beneath the surface to free up the land above for residential building. People would become vertical commuters, going down a huge elevator shaft to work...
...supporters of underground living believe it can be made comfortable with spacious, well-lighted enclosures and liberal use of plants that grow indoors. "Creating an illusion is not so difficult as one might think," says Shoji Takahashi, chief engineer for Asahi Television, which built a studio 66 ft. below Tokyo's fashionable Roppongi district. "When it's raining up there, we use a special shower to create a rainy night in the underground studio...