Tachikawa on a Rainy Day: Indoor Things to Do, a Local Guide

Rained on in Tachikawa? Start on the station’s upper-level decks. A guide to indoor things to do — and why September, not June, is the wettest month here.

日本語で読む（Japanese version）

If you get caught in the rain in Tachikawa (立川), where should you go? When someone asked me that, I was stuck for an answer for a while. There are station buildings. There are department stores. I knew that much. But to say only that and leave it there felt a little unkind to a traveller on a rainy day.

So I decided to look at rainy Tachikawa again, from the rain’s side. And several facts I had never expected came out. The wettest month around Tachikawa is not June, the rainy season. Tokyo Metropolitan Government runs only six tourist information centres in Tokyo, and only one of them is in the Tama area — the western half of Tokyo, beyond the 23 central wards — and it is inside Tachikawa Station. And the North Exit of the station was once a place where water would not drain away whenever it rained, so badly that residents petitioned the town council about it.

Today, at that same North Exit, people step out not onto the ground but onto a floor at second-storey height. How did a station front where the water would not drain become the most reliable place to be on a rainy day? Solving that mystery half at a time, let me take a walk through Tachikawa in the rain.

On a rainy day in Tachikawa, start on the second floor of the station

Here is the answer up front. To pass a rainy day in Tachikawa, first go out through the ticket gates and get onto the pedestrian deck at second-storey height. From there, choose where to go by how much time you have.

With an hour, the station itself is enough. Inside the ticket gates, ecute Tachikawa has cafés that open at 7 a.m. On its third floor is Tokyo Metropolitan Government’s tourist information centre. In Lumine Tachikawa, the station building on the north side, there is a book floor open until 10 p.m.

With two or three hours, cross from the North Exit deck into the Faret Tachikawa district and go into the Tachikawa City Central Library. It holds about 520,000 items. On weekdays it is open until 8 p.m.

With half a day, there are places worth going to precisely because it is raining. Near Takamatsu Station, two monorail stops away, are the National Institute of Polar Research’s Antarctic and Arctic Science Museum, where you can touch Antarctic ice, and the National Institute of Japanese Literature, which exhibits books from the Edo period; both are free. With children, there is the indoor play area and museum at GREEN SPRINGS, Tachikawa Manga Park in the former city hall, and the Tachikawa Life Safety Learning Center, where you can feel shaking just like a real earthquake.

That is the answer for people in a hurry. If you are not in a hurry, stay with me a little longer. Tachikawa’s rain has a history that does not appear on any map.

Tachikawa’s rain falls more in autumn than in the rainy season

If we are talking about rainy days, I first want to know how much rain actually falls on Tachikawa.

There is no Japan Meteorological Agency observation point inside Tachikawa. The nearest is the AMeDAS station (the agency’s automated weather network) at Fuchu, about 6 km to the east. According to the agency’s climate normals, averaged over the 30 years from 1991 to 2020, Fuchu gets 1,598.9 mm of precipitation a year.

Here I found a small comedy. The normal for the “Tokyo” station in Otemachi in the city centre is 1,598.2 mm. Between the middle of Tama and central Tokyo, the difference in a year’s rain is just 0.7 mm. Averaged over 30 years, it comes to about one eye drop. The rain does not discriminate between the 23 wards and Tama.

What really surprised me were the monthly figures. Fuchu’s wettest month is not June, the rainy season (tsuyu, Japan’s early-summer monsoon). It is September, with 246.7 mm. Next is October, with 228.0 mm. June gets 166.6 mm, only about 70 per cent of September’s. Around here, the season of typhoons and long autumn rains is far wetter than the rainy season.

I had always assumed that June was the season of rain. Most people probably do. But going by the numbers, the time to think seriously about rainy-day plans in Tachikawa is not hydrangea season but red spider lily season — the flowers that bloom in Japan around the autumn equinox. Not a story you would want to tell anyone planning a school sports day or excursion.

The driest season, by contrast, is winter. In Fuchu, January gets 56.9 mm, February 52.4 mm and December 58.7 mm — less than a quarter of September. Winter in Tachikawa is dry, and the sky is high. That winter sky I leave to another story in this series, on night views and mornings.

Where does the rain go once it has fallen? The ground of Tachikawa is made of the Kanto loam, layers of volcanic ash, with a layer of gravel below. Rain falling on the plateau soaks into the ground and springs out again at the foot of the terrace cliffs. The spring water of the hake (the local word for these terrace cliffs) that we walked in this series’ story on Yagawa, and the water below the cliffs in the story on the Negawa stream, all began as rain falling on the plateau. Beneath my feet as I walk on the second floor of the station on a rainy day, September’s rain is slowly making its way down through the ground, heading over the years toward the foot of the cliffs. Thinking of that gives the sound of rain on my umbrella a little more depth.

And yet there was a time when the rain that should have soaked away did not drain well at the North Exit.

The North Exit where water would not drain, and the second floor

In 1925, voices were raised in the Tachikawa town council asking for something to be done about flooding in front of the station. A timeline of Tachikawa compiled by Kono Machi Archives tells us the North Exit area was a place where water would not drain away whenever it rained. Work on a drainage channel began around 1943, was still unfinished when the war ended, and was completed in 1947. Two years later, the channel was named the Midorikawa. This story is told in detail in this series’ piece on Tachikawa Station, so here I will keep to the main point.

The main point is this: the North Exit of the station was, from the start, a place that did not cope well with rain.

How did people caught in the rain in Showa-era Tachikawa pass their time? The clue is in the station’s timeline.

For a long time, the way between the north and south sides of the tracks went underground. According to a guide from the Tachikawa City History and Folklore Museum, the station’s underpass opened in 1932. In 1962, another underpass was built near the east level crossing. The North–South Free Passage over the tracks was completed in 1982, and the station building on the north side opened at the same time under the name “WILL.” It was renamed Lumine Tachikawa ten years later, in 1992. Older people may remember the name WILL. For younger ones, the fact that Lumine once had another name will itself be a small surprise.

Rainy-day destinations were different then, too. According to Kono Machi Archives, in the 1960s there were ten cinemas around Tachikawa Station. In 1970, Isetan moved to a new store and Tachikawa Takashimaya opened. When it rained, you ducked through the underpass to the other side of the tracks and into the darkness of a cinema or the bright floors of a department store. That, I imagine, was how Tachikawa sheltered from the rain in those days.

Back then, people went under the tracks on a rainy day. Today, people cross the second floor in front of the station. In the time it took the path to move from underground into the air, a second floor was laid over the ground at the North Exit.

That North Exit is now where people gather most on a rainy day. According to the City of Tachikawa’s timeline, the pedestrian deck at the South Exit came into use in 1999; in 2001, sections of pedestrian-only decks opened at the North and South Exit plazas; and in 2005, the South and North Exit decks were opened. Cars and buses run on the ground, and people walk on the second floor. Over ground where water would not drain, another floor was laid down for people.

When the City of Tachikawa introduces itself, it adds that pedestrian-only decks have been built around JR Tachikawa Station. How the decks link Isetan and Takashimaya S.C. is told in this series’ story on shopping. For a traveller on a rainy day, what matters is what lies beyond. According to Isetan Tachikawa’s official guide, it is a 2-minute walk from the North Exit of JR Tachikawa Station along the pedestrian deck to the 2nd-floor main entrance, and a 1-minute walk from Tachikawa-Kita Station on the Tama Monorail to the 3rd-floor connecting entrance. On the south side, Granduo Tachikawa describes itself in the title of its official website as “directly connected to Tachikawa Station.”

There is one thing I must confess honestly. Where the decks have roofs and where they do not was not written anywhere in the materials I opened. So I cannot claim you can walk “without getting wet.” What I have confirmed is that you can move between the station and the buildings at second-floor height. It is safest to bring an umbrella. It does not make for a slick travel guide, but it is better than complaints from soaked readers.

There is one more place to remember on a rainy day. From the North Exit deck, follow the passage under the monorail and walk north along Sun Sun Road to GREEN SPRINGS. According to its official description, the concept of the buildings is “the town’s engawa,” with eaves creating half-outdoor spaces. An engawa is the wooden veranda along a traditional Japanese house — originally a place for looking out from indoors on a rainy day. About 8 minutes’ walk from the station, under those eaves, you will surely find somewhere to watch Sun Sun Road blurred by rain without getting wet.

Rainy-day Tachikawa in numbers

• 0.7 — Millimetres: the difference in normal annual precipitation between Fuchu and central Tokyo. Averaged over 30 years, practically a draw.
• 246.7 — Millimetres: Fuchu’s normal for September, its wettest month. June, the rainy season, gets 166.6 mm. The spider lilies get wetter than the hydrangeas.
• 1925 — The year voices were raised in the town council about flooding at the North Exit. The rain problem goes back exactly a century.
• 2005 — The year the South and North Exit decks were joined. From then on, people could move between the north and south sides of the station on the second floor.
• 6 — Tokyo Metropolitan Government tourist information centres. Only one of them, inside Tachikawa Station, is in Tama.
• 520,000 — Plus: items held by the Tachikawa City Central Library. There are not enough rainy days to read them all.

So let us begin sheltering from the rain at that “only one in Tama” information centre.

Tama’s only Tokyo Tourist Information Center is inside Tachikawa Station

GO TOKYO, Tokyo’s official tourism website, lists six tourist information centres set up by the metropolitan government: in the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building No. 1, at Busta Shinjuku, in Terminal 3 of Haneda Airport, at Keisei Ueno Station, in Yaesu, and in Tama. The Tama centre — Tokyo Tourist Information Center Tama — is at 3-1-1 Shibasakicho, Tachikawa, on the third floor of ecute Tachikawa.

It is the only Tokyo government tourist information centre outside the 23 wards. Haneda, Shinjuku, Ueno, the Metropolitan Government Building and Yaesu: lined up alongside the places you might call Tokyo’s front doors is Tachikawa Station. The metropolitan government put the front door to Tama here. That, I think, is a line Tachikawa residents are entitled to tell people.

Its hours suit a traveller on a rainy day, too. According to the official information, it is open from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday to Saturday and until 8 p.m. on Sundays and holidays, every day of the year. It offers tourist information on Tokyo and the rest of Japan, suggestions of sights and routes, transport information, introductions to accommodation in Tokyo, free Wi-Fi, and introductions to Tokyo’s tourism volunteers. Wheelchairs and baby buggies can be borrowed. It makes clear that selling goods and tickets, storing luggage and exchanging foreign currency are jobs for the other centres only. A pity if you were hoping to drop off your bags and walk unencumbered in the rain, but for advice on how to spend a rainy day in Tama, there is nobody better to ask.

ecute Tachikawa itself is handy for killing time on a rainy day. According to its official information, the cafés on the third floor open at 7 a.m., and on the first floor there is a café open from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. When the rain grows heavier before work, you can have a cup before leaving the station and watch how the rain is falling. There are surprisingly few stations where you can do that.

There is another information point, too. A list of the places where you can pick up the Faret Tachikawa art map includes, alongside Tokyo Tourist Information Center Tama on the third floor of ecute Tachikawa, a Tachikawa City tourist information corner on the first floor of Tachikawa Tacross. A Tokyo government centre inside the station and a city one just north of it. Counting information points, Tachikawa takes good care of its travellers.

Once you have a map from the information centre, head for somewhere to shelter properly. Beyond the North Exit deck, 520,000 books are waiting.

Sheltering among 520,000 books: Tachikawa City Central Library

Tachikawa City Central Library is a short walk from the North Exit of the station, on the second to fourth floors of the Faret Tachikawa Center Square building. According to the Tachikawa City Library, it opened on 12 January 1995 — the year after the Faret Tachikawa district opened. In the middle of the new district built on former US base land, the city put a library.

The numbers are big. As of the end of March 2024, there were 371,742 items on the open shelves and 154,249 in the closed stacks: about 526,000 in total. Read one a day, and it would take you more than 1,400 years. Gather up every rainy day of my life, and I would probably not reach the end of one shelf.

The layout of each floor is suited to a long rainy-day stay. On the east side of the 2nd floor are general books on the humanities and social sciences, natural sciences, commerce and industry, home and practical life, and literature; on the west side is a corner for magazines and newspapers. The 3rd floor has books on art, sport and language, paperbacks (bunko), foreign-language materials and books for young adults, plus an audiovisual counter and a reference room where staff help with research. The 4th floor is a children’s floor named “The Land of Children’s Books.”

It is open from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. on weekdays, and until 5 p.m. on weekends and holidays. The 4th-floor children’s floor closes at 5 p.m. every day. It is closed every Monday and on the third Thursday of each month, as well as over the New Year and at other times. Staying open late enough on a rainy weekday evening to drop in on the way home from work is the kind of thoughtfulness only a library by the station can offer.

This library has a pleasure you can enjoy only while sheltering from the rain in Tachikawa. According to the Tachikawa City Library’s guide, the Central Library collects materials on the Tachikawa base and airfield as a special collection, gathered in one place under the classification number W-3-10. Materials on Faret Tachikawa’s public art are gathered under W-5-10, and the reference room on the 3rd floor has files on each artist’s career and major works. You read the records of the airfield in a building standing on that airfield’s former site. Under the rain outside the window spreads the ground where the runways once were. As places to read go, you could not ask for a more fitting pairing.

The city also has libraries in Shibasaki, Kamisuna, Saiwai, Nishisuna, Tamagawa, Takamatsu, Nishiki and Wakaba — nine in all, with the Central Library. Spending a rainy day at a branch near home is not bad either. But for a traveller, the central one by the station is the one.

A wayfarer’s quiz

Tokyo Metropolitan Government runs six tourist information centres in Tokyo. How many of them are outside the 23 wards? (A) one (B) two (C) three. The answer is at the end.

When you lift your head from the piles of books, let us talk about places worth going to precisely because it is raining. Under a roof, there is a world so wide that it would almost be a waste to visit on a sunny day.