A small soba counter operates inside Asakusa Underground Street, one of Tokyo’s oldest surviving subterranean shopping arcades. Tucked beneath the streets near Asakusa Station, these compact eateries serve quick bowls of soba and udon to commuters and visitors moving between the metro and the surrounding neighborhood.

Opened in 1955, Asakusa Underground Street is considered the oldest underground shopping street in Japan. Its narrow corridors, low ceilings, and tightly packed storefronts preserve a postwar atmosphere that has largely vanished from Tokyo as major stations modernized. The passageway originally developed as a practical connection point for transit riders, but it evolved into a lively network of bars, snack counters, tobacconists, and small service shops. Today, despite gradual renovation, it remains one of the city’s most atmospheric relics of mid-20th-century urban life—an example of how Tokyo’s underground spaces doubled as both transportation infrastructure and neighborhood social hubs.

Tokyo’s Marunouchi Line is one of Japan’s oldest and busiest subway routes, linking major commercial and governmental districts through a network that dates back to 1954. This view shows the Series 2000 rolling stock, a modernized fleet introduced by Tokyo Metro beginning in 2019 to replace aging Series 02 cars.

The trains feature energy-efficient LED lighting, regenerative braking, and improved accessibility through wider doorways and level boarding. Their bright yellow exterior, trimmed with red and blue stripes, preserves the line’s traditional color while emphasizing the sleek, minimalist design typical of contemporary Japanese transit engineering.

Inside, the cabin layout prioritizes capacity and passenger flow, with longitudinal bench seating covered in patterned orange upholstery and overhead digital route displays in both Japanese and English. The Marunouchi Line operates on a 1,500 V DC overhead catenary and runs entirely underground except for a brief surface section near Nakano-Sakaue, connecting Ikebukuro to Ogikubo over a 24.2-kilometer route that handles hundreds of thousands of passengers daily.