You may know it as the last station in Tokyo where you can catch the Shinkansen for Osaka and Kyoto. But Shinagawa station is also an exchange point for commuters changing from lines carrying them from south of Tokyo. And outside the station, there is an entire entertainment center. Two, in fact. Read more here.
Shinagawa is, by virtue of being a Shinkansen station, one of the major travel centers in Tokyo (together with Ueno, Shinjuku, and Tokyo Station itself). And it is not only an important interchange for passengers on the JR trains. This is also the last station in Tokyo where you can connect from JR trains to the Keikyu line to Haneda Airport.
But Shinagawa has another life outside the station. While the space above the JR tracks has developed into a lively restaurant area, with takeout counters, lunch box sales, bakeries and eateries, this is not all that different from other big JR stations. What is interesting is the area outside the station. In both directions.
On the western side, Shinagawa is home to several large hotels – big enough to hold substantial conference centers. Some of them have more cultural resources – the traditional Japanese garden of the Prince Hotel Shin Takanawa is worth a visit, whether you stay there or not.
At the south end of the chain of hotels to the west of Shingawa station is another small park, located in the recess formed when the mountain was quarried to build Odaiba Fort. The garden is known for its seasonal flowers and impressive waterfall.
But the biggest surprise on the western side of Shinagawa station is squeezed in between the hotels and restaurants. There is a full-blown waterpark folded in between the hotels and office complexes.
The Maxwell Aqua Park manages to have several aquariums (the most popular is the capybara habitat, probably because you can feed them). But other cuddly animals also feature high, like otter and seal mini-shows.
The biggest single attraction of the Maxwell Aqua Park, however, is the dolphin show, performed twice daily. The night version uses projections and laser lightning to create a light show around the dolphins which is worth visiting, whatever you think about dolphin shows.
Impressively enough the aquarium appears bigger on the inside than the outside. The location does not enable the sprawl of other aquariums, but the number of spectacular displays, animal habitats, and other attractions makes the park feel roomy and makes it a full-day destination. After all, there is a buffet restaurant if the family gets hungry, and in case you get tired of oceanic associations, there is an old-style merry-go-round in the middle of the maritime displays.
To the south of the station, past the confusingly named Kita Shinagawa (North Shinagawa) station, there is a shrine dedicated to Daitokuten, the god of wealth, and one of the seven gods in a grain of rice. If you want it purified, you can wash your money here. Or just say a prayer. You would be in good company: Before he went to the battle of Sekigahara, that cemented his power, Tokugawa Ieyasu himself prayed here. As a token of gratitude for the victory, the shogunate took over the maintenance of the shrine, which is why it is so stylish even today. There are actually several shrines grouped together, including an unusual mound, covered in concrete today but constructed from lava stones brought from mount Fuji. The practice of Fuji worship led the practitioners to be blessed if they climbed the mountain; for those too old or infirm there were these mounds at shrines around Tokyo.
The western side of Shinagawa station also features several upscale restaurants, many of whom have or aspire to Michelin stars. And then there is a restaurant directly across the street from the Takanawa exit (in front of the Shinagawa Prince hotel) which offers down-to-earth food at reasonable prices.
Tsubasa Grill is one of those rare places that you occasionally find in Tokyo. It has been around since 1930 serving the same food: Steaks, hamburgers, and sausages (with vegetables on the side). With a track record like that, you know they must be good, especially since the restaurant concept has been turned into a chain that can be found in other places in Tokyo as well.
If the upscale places dominate the spaces between the hotels, the opposite is true on the other side of the station. Here, the restaurant area is much more traditional, oriented towards slaking the thirsts and sating the hungers of the ”salarymen” working in the office buildings in the area, which includes the Sony global headquarters (alas, an anonymous square glass and concrete colossus, recognizable only because of the prominent Sony sign).
As this is not just any restaurant area, it has a somewhat international flair, with both German, Chinese, and Italian restaurants. The German restaurant also offers a wide selection of craft beer.
But continue walking perpendicularly to the railway, and it will only be a few blocks until you arrive at something completely different: The sea.
Actually, you will only see a small canal. The southwestern parts of Tokyo are built on islands created by filling up the mud flats that used to stretch out into Tokyo Bay. You may have thought that it was only Odaiba and the 2020 Olympic Village which were created this way, but large parts of Tokyo are built on filled-up mudflats. It started as soon as Tokyo was created – it used to be possible to sail a ship all the way to where Tokyo Station sits today. And no small ship either, but one of the Dutch trading ships.
The Shinagawa area to the east of the station used to be the Tokyo port, but as freight has moved into containers and containers onto container ships, Tokyo Bay has become too narrow and shallow and freight to the Tokyo area is now handled in the port of Yokohama.
So the channels that used to be full of ships loading and unloading are eerily quiet, and the warehouses have been replaced by ”Manshons” (the Japanese word for condominiums) and the stevedores by salarymen. This part of Tokyo has turned into a huge residential area, where relatively large apartments and close proximity to central Tokyo has created a subculture of ”Canalistas”, in particular among the stay-at-home wives of the salarymen. But even though a quiet stroll along the canals can be refreshing, there is not much to see.
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