Silence informed my distance from the neighbourhood’s centre. Without realising it, I had wandered far afield. Rows of houses and gridded apartment buildings parted only occasionally to reveal a view beyond. Through one gap, I glimpsed a flash of Chūō Line orange across a distant viaduct. Only a narrow section of the bridge was visible, framed by a tangle of overhead wires. The train crossed that slice in a matter of seconds before disappearing again. Brief as it was, the sight left me thinking about why, in Tokyo, trains so often appear like this, elevated above the street.

Born of Edo’s winding footpaths and waterways, the city was never suited to road traffic. From the late nineteenth century, Tokyo began to develop around rail. Even during the economic boom of the 1960s, road congestion and car-ownership regulations kept rail dominant. Urban centres formed around major terminals, while suburban lines extended outward. Many neighbourhoods therefore grew around the tracks, rather than rail being retrofitted into existing communities.

Throughout this period, the high cost of running tracks underground and the impracticalities of level crossings often made elevated railways the most practical solution. Over time, commercial activity and neighbourhood life expanded into the spaces beneath these viaducts. Railway operators increasingly recognised the value of this under-track land, developing a business model in which infrastructure also functioned as real estate.

The result is an unusually extensive elevated railway network. Up above, trains are frequently seen darting between skyscrapers, flying over intersections, and running close to homes. It produces a field of fragmented views across Tokyo, filled with train-line-coloured flashes.

As the Chūō Rapid flickered by, its flying carriages served as a marker of my position within the neighbourhood. I seldom walk completely mapless in any metropolis—it has become natural to rely on smartphone navigation. Head buried in the tiny screen, with detailed directions too readily available, we miss the moments of urban beauty around us and lose sight of the city’s own cues.

Soon, I began to hear schoolchildren chattering and bicycle bells ringing past. Amid them, a low hum rose. I scanned the streetscape, looking up at rooftops, searching for its source. The sound grew, metal clattering and wheels squealing, before fading just as quickly. All in seconds, I never quite caught sight of the train.

Naturally, I felt the urge to chase the sound and pair it with its corresponding scene. But over time, I’ve come to appreciate just listening. The direction from which the sound arrives and continues points to the location of the station, while its regularity keeps my bearings close at hand. Reassuring like a compass, the soundscape plays its part in guiding me. Even in the quietest neighbourhood, I remain aware of Tokyo’s constant motion.

I followed the sound until I came to what felt like the area’s main shopping street. Sensing I was nearing the station, I decided to walk directly beneath the viaduct. Close enough to touch the structure, I considered its parts: columns raising crossbeams and viaduct decks; rail-fastened slab tracks shuttling carriages along the line; seismic bearings and dampers slotted between them to absorb sudden shocks. As I did so, a physical sensation hit me—a deep, low hum reverberating through the pavement and travelling upward through my body. Beneath a train flying overhead, the structure made me feel grounded.

Eventually, I arrived back at Asagaya Station. The train would keep moving onward to Shinjuku before cutting through the inner city and back out towards the eastern suburbs. I thought of the passengers it carried daily: the millions transported between work and home. I’d walked only a fraction of the network on my afternoon meander.

Every metropolis carries its own sense of vastness, and its own cues for locating oneself within it. Take the period brick houses of London, or the broad boulevards of New York. But while there are many indicators that I am on Tokyo’s streets, the most unmistakable, perhaps, exists above them, weaving through its sky.

✺ Kiara

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