Tokyo Shinjuku JR Live Cam Omoideyokocho 2024
About the Shinjuku Omoide Yokocho Camera
This camera covers Omoide Yokocho, the narrow lane of tiny bars and grill counters squeezed against the tracks on the west side of Shinjuku Station. The name translates roughly as Memory Lane.
It began as a postwar black market beside the station and never really changed shape. Most of the establishments seat under a dozen people, many of them at a counter facing a charcoal grill, and the alley itself is barely wide enough for two people to pass. The smoke, the lanterns and the tight frontages are what people come for.
The rhythm is entirely nocturnal. Through the day it is mostly shuttered and easy to walk through; from early evening the grills fire up and it becomes genuinely congested. A fire in 1999 destroyed part of the lane and it was rebuilt, which is why some frontages look newer than others.
Highlights & Nearby
- •Watch for: lanterns and grill smoke after dark, congestion in the alley, the shuttered daytime look
- •Nearby: Shinjuku Station west exit, Kabukicho, Golden Gai, Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building
- •Note: quiet and largely shuttered by day; crowded from early evening onward
