Tokyo on Street View

How to recognise the city from a panorama

Tokyo panoramas give themselves away by vertical signage — Japanese shopfront text usually runs top to bottom. The other giveaway is yellow tactile paving, laid on nearly every pavement in Japan.

What the streets look like

Streets are narrow, kerbs are often absent entirely, and cables run openly along poles. Cars are mostly white or silver, with plenty of kei cars — small boxy bodies on yellow plates.

How to tell it from lookalikes

Vertical signage and kana separate it from Seoul, where only hangul appears and signs run horizontally. From Taipei it differs by the near absence of scooters, which swarm there.

Useful details

Junction signs are blue with white text and repeat in Latin script. Vending machines stand right on the pavement — nothing else in the region does that.

Geogessr drops you somewhere random in the world — sometimes in Tokyo. Work out where you are and drop a pin on the map.

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