Northeast Tokyo · KatsushikaNo.914★★Open in map →

Shibamata Taishakuten

— Tokyo's Tora-san temple and its dango-lined approach

localOff the trail — and worth it

A Nichiren temple at Tokyo's northeastern edge, reached by a short lane of wooden shopfronts selling grass-flavoured rice dumplings. Street and temple are protected together as a national Important Cultural Landscape, and the walk between them is the point.

FromUeno Station
~35 minKeisei train, 1 stop from Takasago
Get off atShibamata Station (Keisei Kanamachi Line)
On foot
Shibamata Taishakuten

Directions ↗

The sweet spot

Shibamata is well known inside Japan and barely known outside it, and that gap is the whole appeal. The crowd is domestic and mostly older, the shops are family-run, and very little on the street is translated. It fills up on weekends and on festival days, and it is quiet on an ordinary weekday morning.

Where it is

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What to look for — in walking order

Tora-san and Sakura statuestwo bronze figures on the station square, the wanderer setting out and the sister seeing him go
The approach streeta short lane of tile-roofed shops selling grass dumplings and rice crackers, part of a national Important Cultural Landscape
Nitenmon gatethe carved two-storey gate of 1896 standing where the shopping lane ends
The carving galleryrelief panels of scenes from the Lotus Sutra wrapped around the inner sanctuary, entered on a separate ticket
Suikeien gardena pond garden seen from a roofed wooden corridor that runs around its edge

How to actually get there

Keisei-Ueno Station → Keisei-Takasago (Keisei Main Line, about 20 min).
Keisei-Takasago → Shibamata (Keisei Kanamachi Line, 1 stop).
Shibamata Station → the gateway arch over the approach street (walk about 3 min across the square).
Walk the lane to the Nitenmon gate, then into the temple grounds beyond it.

Keisei Main Line, then the Kanamachi branch: Keisei-Ueno Station → Keisei-Takasago on the Keisei Main Line (about 20 minutes), then one stop on the Keisei Kanamachi Line to Shibamata. The branch train runs every few minutes. From the station the approach street begins across the square, about 3 minutes on foot.
Return via Keisei-Takasago: Shibamata → Keisei-Takasago (one stop), then the Keisei Main Line back toward Ueno, or onward to Narita Airport without changing companies. The branch line stops running before midnight, so check the platform board if you stay for an evening meal.

Directions from my location (Google Maps) ↗

About the place

Shibamata sits on flat ground at the northeastern edge of Tokyo, close to the Edo River. Its temple, Taishakuten, belongs to the Nichiren school, and the lane running from the station square to the temple gate is the reason most people come. The shopfronts along it are low and wooden, the signboards hand-painted, and the whole stretch is protected as a national Important Cultural Landscape. A long-running postwar film series used this street as its hero's home ground, so Japanese visitors arrive already knowing it by heart. Visitors from abroad mostly do not, which makes the walk read differently: an ordinary working shopping street that happens to be preserved.

How to enjoy it

Arrive before the shutters go up and the lane belongs to deliveries and the temple bell; by midday it belongs to dumpling steam and queues. Buy the rice dumplings warm from the counter rather than boxed to take away, and eat them where you bought them. The carving gallery and the garden are worth the separate ticket for the corridor view alone.

Background & history

The temple was founded in 1629, and the settlement grew up around the pilgrim traffic that came to it. The two-storey Nitenmon gate at the head of the grounds dates from 1896 and carries a pair of guardian kings. Behind the main hall, carvers spent years covering the inner sanctuary in relief panels drawn from the Lotus Sutra. The pond garden beyond it is a modern addition, designed to be viewed from a wooden corridor rather than walked through.

Before you go

Cash: The temple grounds and the approach street are free to walk. A separate admission covers the carving gallery and the garden. Many of the older shops on the lane still prefer cash.
Good to know: The shops keep their own hours and most shut in the early evening, so the lane empties long before the trains stop. The route is flat and paved the whole way.
Another way: From Ueno or Nippori take the JR Joban Line to Kanamachi, walk across to Keisei-Kanamachi, and ride one stop to Shibamata from the other end of the branch line.
After you get off: Leave Shibamata Station by its single exit, pass the two bronze figures on the square, and the gateway arch over the approach street stands directly ahead.