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New Hizure Ôhashi Bridge New Hizure Ôhashi Bridge (Viewed from Upstream)

A: At the time of its construction in 1957, the old Hizure Ôhashi was the longest (220 m) bridge of its type (Parallel-Chord Warren Truss) in Japan, and the second longest in all of Asia. It was a single-lane bridge, however, and in recent years caused frequent traffic jams since vehicles had to stop and wait whenever opposing traffic was coming across. It even lacked pedestrian lanes, providing "cut-outs" instead every fifty meters or so where pedestrians could take refuge when a wide truck came along. The old bridge was still in use when we first came to Fujino in fall of 1993, but the new Hizure Ôhashi (shown here) was already under construction. The new bridge opened in April, 1994, even before our house was completed, and the old bridge, located about 100 meters downstream from the new one, was quickly dismantled. This raises the issue again of imagination, since one wonders why the old bridge—longest of its type in Japan when constructed—couldn't have been kept for historical reasons; suggestions had indeed been made that it could be made the site of a regular crafts fair or remodeled to serve other purposes. A new single-span bridge could even have been built next to the old one to handle traffic in the opposite direction. The alacrity with which the old one was torn down suggests again how historical things are forgotten on the way to modernity, when they might in fact contribute to a town's future. Compare this to the way my home town Portland, Oregon has taken care of its ten bridges—three of which date to before the Titanic. To return to your previous location, use your browser's "BACK" button, or click your heels together three times while saying, "there's no place like home" . . .

Green Gables: A Contemplative Companion to Fujino Township
by Norman Havens nhavens@gol.com
Updated: April 20, 2002

URL: http://www2.gol.com/users/nhavens/