# How has Tokyo changed over time?

> Tokyo grew from the shogun's castle town of Edo into a modern capital, rebuilt twice in the 20th century after the 1923 earthquake and the 1945 bombing.

Tokyo began as Edo, a castle town that became the seat of the Tokugawa shoguns in 1603 and one of the largest cities in the world. It was renamed Tokyo in 1868, then almost entirely rebuilt twice: after the 1923 Great Kanto earthquake and after the firebombing of 1945. That is why most of the city a visitor sees today is postwar, with older layers surviving in pockets.

## Edo: the shogun's city (1603-1868)

Tokugawa Ieyasu made Edo his base in 1590, and it became the shogunate's capital in 1603 while the emperor stayed in Kyoto. By the 18th century Edo had over a million people. The low-lying merchant districts by the Sumida River, known as *shitamachi*, and the samurai estates on the higher ground shaped the city's layout for centuries.

## Meiji: a new name and a new capital

In 1868 the city was renamed Tokyo, "Eastern Capital," and the emperor moved there. Edo Castle became the Imperial Palace. Japan's first railway opened in 1872 between Shimbashi and Yokohama, and brick buildings appeared in Ginza and Marunouchi. Tokyo Station, with its red-brick Marunouchi building, opened in 1914.

## Destroyed twice: 1923 and 1945

The Great Kanto earthquake on September 1, 1923, and the fires that followed killed more than 100,000 people and burned much of the old wooden city. Two decades later, American firebombing raids in 1945 destroyed large parts of Tokyo again; the raid of March 9-10 alone killed roughly 100,000 people. The city was rebuilt quickly and mostly without a master plan, which explains its dense, mixed streets.

## The 1964 Olympics and the boom years

The 1964 Summer Olympics marked Tokyo's postwar comeback. The Tokaido Shinkansen to Osaka opened just before the Games, along with several Metropolitan Expressway routes and the monorail to Haneda Airport. During the economic boom and the late-1980s "bubble," skyscrapers rose in west Shinjuku, and the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building moved there in 1991. Shibuya grew into a youth and fashion hub.

## Tokyo today

Tokyo Skytree opened in 2012, and Shibuya has been heavily redeveloped around the station. The 2020 Olympics were postponed by the pandemic and held in 2021, mostly without spectators.

## Where to see each layer

- **Edo:** the stone walls of Edo Castle in the Imperial Palace East Gardens; Nihonbashi, the old starting point of Japan's highways.
- **Old shitamachi:** Asakusa and Senso-ji, Tokyo's oldest temple (rebuilt after the war); Yanaka, which escaped much of the destruction.
- **Meiji and Taisho:** the restored Tokyo Station and Marunouchi.
- **1964:** the expressway running right over Nihonbashi bridge.
- **Modern Tokyo:** Shinjuku's towers, Shibuya Crossing, Skytree.

The Edo-Tokyo Museum in Ryogoku, the best single overview of the city's history, reopened on March 31, 2026 after a renovation that began in 2022.

## FAQ

**Why are there so few old buildings in Tokyo?**
The 1923 earthquake fires and the 1945 bombing destroyed most of the wooden city, and later redevelopment replaced much of what survived.

**When did Edo become Tokyo?**
In 1868, at the start of the Meiji era, when the emperor moved from Kyoto.

**Which Tokyo neighborhood feels the most old-fashioned?**
Yanaka, with its temples, narrow lanes and low wooden houses, is the usual answer; Asakusa has the most famous old temple.

**Were the 2020 Tokyo Olympics held in 2020?**
No. They were postponed because of COVID-19 and held in summer 2021, still under the name Tokyo 2020.

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https://inyourtravel.com/how-has-tokyo-changed-over-time/ · In Your Travel · Checked 2026-10-31