This essay documents how pseudo-moralistic narratives promoted by Asahi Shimbun and a bizarre stadium proposal aired by NHK Osaka undermined a long-term redevelopment plan for Osaka’s North Yard, ultimately forcing the author to turn to the internet.

2017-05-08
What follows is a continuation of the previous section.
When the handling of the former Japanese National Railways land in front of Osaka Station became unbearably outrageous, I alone confronted three parties—the Osaka City Government, the Kansai Economic Federation, and the Kansai Association of Corporate Executives—and for three months pressed them on why the project could not proceed according to the outstanding business plan that had been built over more than twenty years by assembling the collective wisdom of the public and private sectors in Osaka.
As readers know, during the period from 2009 to 2010 I still believed that Asahi Shimbun was a representative newspaper of Japan, and I subscribed to it and read it closely.
Accordingly, I put in writing the points I raised with the parties above and, each time, had one of my company’s employees deliver them to Tagaya, who was running a major Asahi Shimbun feature series titled “The Confusion of the North Yard.”
The strange proposal to halt the second-phase land sale and turn the area into a green park—an extreme example of malicious pseudo-moralism—was how Asahi Shimbun concealed its own strategy, and I continued to write about this.
As already noted, the moment I read an article on floor-area ratios published in SAPIO by Kenichi Ohmae, I instantly grasped what was really going on.
Then, unbelievably, NHK Osaka aired a report on its 6 p.m. evening news proposing to build a soccer stadium on the second-phase site, which is one of the most prime commercial locations in Japan, in order to attract a World Cup.
I was stunned by the absurdity, strangeness, and sheer foolishness of this and could only mutter, “Give me a break already,” but I had thought I could not afford to spend any more time on the matter.
As readers also know, it was at that point that I concluded I had no choice but to appear on the internet.
The next chapter is the paper I published on July 24, 2010, shortly after making that reluctant transition.