U.S. Military Residential Site in Yokohama Returned to Japan

Yokohama, June 30 (Jiji Press)–The U.S. military returned its 43-hectare Negishi residential site in Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture, south of Tokyo, to Japan on Tuesday, based on an agreement the two countries signed in 2004. “We are very glad that our long-held desire was realized,” Yokohama Mayor Takeharu Yamanaka told Yukihiro Sukisaki, director-general of the Japanese Defense Ministry’s South Kanto Defense Bureau, who reported the return of the site. Yamanaka asked the ministry to ensure an early return of the remaining site under the agreement. In 2004, Tokyo and Washington agreed that the U.S. military would give back to Japan sites in Kanagawa occupying a total of 419 hectares, including the Negishi site, in return for Japan building some 700 houses in the Yokohama area of the U.S. military’s Ikego residential site. Of the Kanagawa sites, the Koshiba petroleum, oil and lubricants depot, the Tomioka storage area, and the Fukaya and Kamiseya communication sites, totaling about 375 hectares, have been returned to Japan. Following the return of the Negishi site, a 1-hectare enclave in the Ikego site became the only remaining unreturned site under the 2004 agreement. The Yokohama city government plans to utilize the returned Negishi site by creating residential areas and a new facility for Yokohama City University’s school of medicine and expanding the neighboring Negishi Forest Park. Mayor Yamanaka said at a regular press conference that the city is eager to develop the site into a town in which people can feel a sense of well-being, while enhancing disaster resilience and convenience. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]