Saitama Prefecture


Saitama Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kantō region of Honshu. Saitama Prefecture has a population of 7,338,536 and has a geographic area of 3,797 km². Saitama Prefecture borders Tochigi Prefecture and Gunma Prefecture to the north, Nagano Prefecture to the west, Yamanashi Prefecture to the southwest, Tokyo to the south, Chiba Prefecture to the southeast, and Ibaraki Prefecture to the northeast.
Saitama is the capital and largest city of Saitama Prefecture, with other major cities including Kawaguchi, Kawagoe, and Tokorozawa. Saitama Prefecture is part of the Greater Tokyo Area, the most populous metropolitan area in the world, and many of its cities are described as bedroom communities and suburbs of Tokyo with many residents commuting into the city each day.

History

According to Sendai Kuji Hongi, Chichibu was one of 137 provinces during the reign of Emperor Sujin. Chichibu Province was in western Saitama.
The area that would become Saitama Prefecture in the 19th century is part of Musashi Province in the Ritsuryō Imperial administration of antiquity capital area provinces /7 circuits which was nominally revived in the Meiji restoration but has lost much of its administrative function since the Middle Ages. Saitama District ' was one of Musashi's 21 ritsuryō districts.
In the fifth year of the Keiun era, deposits of copper were reported to have been found in the Chichibu District of what is now Saitama Prefecture.
The Saitama area was historically known as a fertile agricultural region which produced much of the food for the Kantō region. During the Edo period, many fudai daimyōs ruled small domains within the Saitama area.
At the end of the early modern Edo period, large parts of present-day Saitama were part of the shogunate domain or the often subsumed holdings of smaller vassals ' around Edo, major areas were part of the fiefdoms ' Kawagoe, Oshi and Iwatsuki ; few territories were held by domains seated in other provinces.
In the Meiji Restoration, after being briefly united with other rural shogunate territories in Musashi under Musashi governors ', many former shogunate/hatamoto territories in Northwestern Musashi became Ōmiya Prefecture, soon renamed to Urawa in 1868/69, with some territories held by other short-lived prefectures and Nirayama/later mainly Shizuoka, Kanagawa and Tokyo :ja:韮山県|. In the replacement of -han with -ken, the associated territorial consolidation and first wave of prefectural mergers in 1871/72, Oshi and Iwatsuki prefectures were merged into Urawa; after consolidation, it consisted of the entire Saitama District and Northern parts of Adachi and Katsushika and was renamed to Saitama. The government of the prefecture was to be set up in Iwatsuki Town, Saitama District in November 1871 by the Dajōkan ordinance to set up the prefecture, but ultimately remained in Urawa's previous prefectural government seat in Urawa Town in Adachi District.
Kawagoe Prefecture was consolidated with other territories into Iruma Prefecture which consisted of 13 districts of Musashi in the Western part of present-day Saitama. In 1873, Iruma was merged with Gunma to become Kumagaya. But Kumagaya was split up again in 1876: The area of Kōzuke province came back as a second Gunma prefecture, and the territories in Musashi province/former Iruma prefecture were merged into Saitama. Except for the transfer of a few municipalities to Tokyo in the 1890s/1900s and several smaller, 20th century changes through cross-prefectural municipal mergers or transfers of neighbourhoods, Saitama had reached its present extent.
In the modern reactivation of districts as administrative unit in 1878/79, Saitama was subdivided into originally 18 districts based on the ancient divisions of Musashi, but with only nine district government offices, and the number of districts was formally merged down to nine in 1896/97: North Adachi, Iruma, Hiki, Chichibu, Kodama, Ōsato, North Saitama, South Saitama, and North Katsushika. Niikura, one of the original 1878/79 modern districts, was first merged into North Adachi in 1896, but a substantial part of its former territory was subsequently transferred to the North Tama and North Toshima districts of Tokyo. In the creation of modern cities, towns and villages in 1889, these districts were subdivided into originally 40 towns and 368 villages. The first city in Saitama was only established in 1922 when Kawagoe Town from Iruma District became Kawagoe City. The prefectural capital, Urawa in North Adachi, remained a town until 1934. After the Great Shōwa mergers of the 1950s, the number of municipalities in Saitama had shrunk to 95, including 23 cities by then. The Great Heisei mergers of the 2000s pushed the number below 70.
After World War II, as Tokyo expanded rapidly and modern transportation allowed longer commutes, the lack of available land in Tokyo led to the rapid development of Saitama Prefecture, where the population has nearly tripled since 1960. Most of the cities in the prefecture are closely connected to downtown Tokyo by metropolitan rail, and operate largely as residential and commercial suburbs of Tokyo.
In 2001, Urawa City was merged with Ōmiya City and Yono City to create Saitama City as the new enlarged capital. It became the prefecture's first designated major city in 2003.

Geography

Saitama Prefecture is bordered by Tokyo, Chiba, Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma, Nagano, and Yamanashi Prefectures. It is located central-west of the Kanto region, measuring 103 km from east to west and 52 km from north to south. At 3,797.75 km2, it ranks as the ninth-smallest prefecture. The eastern border with Chiba Prefecture is defined by the Edo River. The northern and north-western border lines with Gunma Prefecture are marked by the Tone River and the Kanagawa River and the drainage divides of the Arakawa River and Kanagawa River. The southwestern border is defined by the drainage divides of the Arakawa River, Tama River, and Fuefuki River. The eastern section of the southern border line, however, does not overlap with any geological feature.
The topography of Saitama Prefecture is largely divided by the Hachiōji Tectonic Line, which runs through Kodama, Ogawa, and Hannō, into the western mountain area and the eastern lowland area. The altitude, highest on the western side, gradually lowers eastward from mountain ranges to hills to plateaus to lowlands. The eastern lowlands and plateaus occupy 67.3% of the area.
The eastern side, part of the Kantō Plain, can be further divided into nine separate expanses of hills and ten plateaus. The former occupy small areas neighboring the Kantō Mount Range, including the Hiki Hills and Sayama Hills. The latter are mainly surrounded by alluvial flood plains. In the southeastern portion of the prefecture, the Ōmiya Plateau stands in a southeastward direction, sandwiched by the Furutone River to the east and the Arakawa River to the west.
The western side of the prefecture belongs to the Kantō Mountain Range with Chichibu Basin located in its center. The area to the west of the basin features high peaks such as Mount Sanpō on the Western border with Nagano, Saitama's highest mountain, and Mount Kōbushi, in which the Arakawa River has its source. Most of the land is contained in Chichibu Tama Kai National Park. The area to east of the basin consists of relatively low mountains.

Cities

Forty cities are located in Saitama Prefecture:
These are the towns and villages in each district:

Transportation

Radial transportation to and from Tokyo dominates transportation in the prefecture. Circular routes were constructed as bypasses to avoid congestion in central Tokyo.

Roads

The Jōban, Kan-etsu, Shuto, Tōhoku, and Tokyo-Gaikan expressways form parts of the nationwide expressway network. National highway Routes 4, 16, and 17 are important routes in Kantō region.

Railways

in Saitama City forms East Japan Railway Company's northern hub station in the Greater Tokyo Area, offering transfers to and from Shinkansen high-speed lines. The Musashino serves as a freight bypass line as well as a passenger line.
Chichibu Railway the northwestern,
Seibu Railway the southwestern,
Tobu Railway the midwestern and the eastern,
the New Shuttle and Saitama Railway the southeastern
parts of the prefecture respectively.
The Tsukuba Express line crosses the southeastern corner of the prefecture.
and Narita International Airport are the closest major civil airports. Commuter helicopter flights from Kawajima to Narita Airport are offered.
Honda Airport for general aviation, and the JASDF's Iruma Air Base and Kumagaya Air Base.

Waterways

Rivers and canals, including those developed in the Edo period in the east of the prefecture, are largely disused following the introduction of motorised land transport. Traces of water transport are found on the Tone River, which forms the border between Saitama and Gunma Prefecture, and on the Arakawa River, which includes a tourist attraction in Nagatoro.

Culture

Mass media

See Mass media in Saitama Prefecture.

Politics and government

Like all prefectural administrations, Saitama's is headed by a governor who is directly elected to four-year terms since 1947. The current incumbent is Motohiro Ōno, a former DPFP member of the Diet who was elected in August 2019 with centre-left support and 47.9% of the vote against centre-right supported former baseball player Kenta Aoshima and three other candidates.
Also as in all prefectures, prefectural by-laws, the budget and the approval of important prefectural administrative appointments such as the vice-governors or members of the public safety commission, are the prerogative of the assembly which is elected directly to four-year terms on an independent electoral cycle. That may or may not be synchronized with the gubernatorial term; currently, it is not, as it is still part of the unified local election cycle. In the last round in April 2019, the LDP maintained its outright majority with 48 of the 93 seats in the assembly. As in most prefectures, the Saitama assembly was established legally in 1878 and first convened 1879.
In the National Diet, Saitama's directly elected delegation consists of 15 members of the House of Representatives and currently seven in the House of Councillors. The latest prefecture-wide election was the House of Councillors by-election in October 2019 to fill the seat vacated by Motohiro Ōno; it was won by the previous governor Kiyoshi Ueda who has a centre-left background, but without full-scale party backing and without any other major party-backed candidate in the race.

List of governors since 1947

GovernorTerm startTerm end
Jitsuzo Nishimura 12 April 194728 March 1949
Yuichi Osawa 17 May 194928 May 1956
Hiroshi Kurihara 13 July 195612 July 1972
Yawara Hata 13 July 197212 July 1992
Yoshihiko Tsuchiya 13 July 199218 July 2003
Kiyoshi Ueda 31 August 200330 August 2019
Motohiro Ohno 31 August 2019Incumbent

Sister relationships

Saitama Prefecture has a number of sister city relationships with states and a province as listed below.
The sports teams listed below are based in Saitama.

[Football (soccer)]

Most of the popular tourist sites in Saitama are located in the northwestern part of the prefecture, which is known as the Chichibu Region. This region mostly consists of a hilly and moderately mountainous area, and is situated in a rich natural environment. The region is very popular among residents of Saitama and neighboring prefectures for short trips, as it is easily accessible via the railroad network.

Visitor attractions

Kobaton is the prefectural mascot, a Eurasian collared dove, which is also the prefectural bird. Kobaton was made originally as the mascot of the fifty-ninth annual national athletic meeting held in the prefecture in 2004, and was inaugurated as mascot of the prefecture in 2005 with an inauguration ceremony and a letter of appointment from the governor. A wheelchair-using version of Kobaton also exists.

Citations