I recently spent several days in Kochi Japan, a city of around 400,000 population on the mainly rural Island of Shikoku. Shikoku is the smallest and least populated of the four main Japanese Islands, but still has more people than all of New Zealand. The climate is not unlike that of Northland. The Island is about 200 km wide and between 120 and 80 km from top to bottom. There are four big cities on Shikoku all around 400,000, and Kochi is on the South side of the island.
The Centre of the city, as with most Japanese cities is the Railway Station, all other transport radiates from there. In Kochi, the modern Station is the terminus of bus and tram lines and the station incorporates huge parking areas for bicycles.
All the footpaths I saw in the city were clearly divided between the bicycles and pedestrians.
This photo was taken early on Sunday morning on my way to the huge Kochi Sunday Market where a one kilometre stretch of road is closed for over 500 stalls. The market has been going for 300 years.
Outside this supermarket you can see how bike parking takes precedence over car parking
Downtown, the main shopping streets are covered at the second storey roofline but open to the air at ground level. There are bicycles everywhere. I was surprised to see how so many people ignored "no bikes" sign and stay on their bikes in the shopping district...I thought the Japanese were a compliant people, but I guess they make their own choices about where to use their bikes.
I was staying at an inexpensive 'business' hotel near the station and my hotel provided bikes for the use of guests at no charge. One day I took a train trip to a larger town on the west side of the island and just had a few hours to explore before needed to get the train back to Kochi and at the Railway station in Uwajima they rented bikes for 100 Yen per hour [NZ $1.60]. This enabled me to get a very good look around for two hours.
I would imagine most cities this size in Japan would be catering to bicycles as much as Kochi, but the fact the downtown area is flat and the streets are wide and the climate less extreme than other places has gone to make Kochi a very bike friendly place to visit.
If you are planning to visit Japan I would highly recommend spending time on Shikoku. Easiest access is from Osaka airport which is quite close whereas it is at least a 6 hours train trip from Tokyo. Air New Zealand flies into Osaka and Tokyo. More remote places can be accesses by using Qantas from Australia, who fly into the most Southern island of Kyushu.
Ron Resnick, Nelson