Where the name Yokohama comes from, what stood here before the station, and what you can still spot on a walk today. Then the events near the station that we have checked on the official pages.
The name Yokohama comes from an extraordinary piece of coastal geography. A long, narrow sandbar once extended across the shoreline between the areas now known as Motomachi and Noge. Behind it lay a broad inlet. A small fishing settlement on the sandbar became known as Yokohama Village. The original Yokohama was therefore much closer to today's Kannai district than to the enormous railway station bearing its name.
Everything changed when Yokohama opened as an international port in 1859. The fishing settlement developed into a trading city, while reclamation transformed the surrounding inlet into streets and neighborhoods. Northwest of the original port, another inlet known as Sodegaura occupied part of the area around today's Yokohama Station. Agricultural reclamation and railway construction gradually converted this shoreline into solid urban land.
Leave Yokohama Station by the east exit and walk toward Takashimacho. Much of the flat landscape around you was created through reclamation. The name of a small village on a coastal sandbar has expanded across a major city, while the station itself stands on land that underwent a separate transformation from water to modern transport infrastructure.
→ Walk east from Yokohama Station toward Takashimacho and look for the Katabira and Ishizaki river channels. Much of this flat district was once coastal water or reclaimed land. The original Yokohama Village lay farther southeast near Kannai.
Sources (in Japanese): 横浜開港資料館・ハマの大地を創る 吉田新田の開発, 横浜市西区・知ってる？西区のむかし
Yokohama Station has occupied three different locations. When Japan's first railway opened between Shimbashi and Yokohama in 1872, its terminus stood at today's Sakuragicho Station. In 1915, the station moved to Takashimacho, where an impressive red-brick building served passengers. The Great Kanto Earthquake destroyed that second station in 1923. The third Yokohama Station opened at the present site in 1928.
The surrounding landscape was originally very different. During the Edo period, an inlet and marshy ground lay near the mouth of the Katabira River. Much of the present west-side district occupied an area associated with Sodegaura, a former coastal inlet. Reclamation gradually created farmland and then railway land. The surviving river channels around the station offer reminders of its watery past. Walking southeast toward Takashimacho also takes you toward the second station's former location.
After World War II, the west exit area was still used for storing gravel and construction materials. Takashimaya opened a small store here in 1956, followed by a full department store in 1959. Today's extraordinary shopping district developed from reclaimed coastal ground into a railway hub and then a major commercial center.
→ Explore Yokohama Takashimaya and the busy west-side shopping streets, once used as material storage grounds.
Sources (in Japanese): 横浜都市発展記念館・鉄道と横浜 横浜駅をめぐる明治・大正・昭和, 横浜市西区・横浜髙島屋の歴史
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We list events we could confirm on the official page or official Instagram of the venue or organiser. Details can change, tickets sell out and venues close, so check the official page before you go. Distances are straight-line and travel times are rough estimates. Photos show the venue or its surroundings, not the event itself. Titles and descriptions are our own translations from Japanese. This site contains affiliate links (ads).