The “ultra-rare” tour to the top of the main tower of the Rainbow Bridge, which celebrated its 30th anniversary, was conducted by an extremely high-demanding 73 times higher than the average!

On August 26, 2011, the Rainbow Bridge, which connects central Tokyo and the waterfront subcenter, celebrated its 30th anniversary. To celebrate this milestone, a “Main Tower Climbing Tour” was held on August 26 to climb the highest “Main Tower” of the Rainbow Bridge. The tour took 24 lucky couples selected by lottery to the top of the Rainbow Bridge’s main tower, which is normally inaccessible to the public. The number of applicants was 1,753, 73 times higher than the number of applicants who applied for the tour.

Before we get into the details of this “extremely rare tour,” let us look back at the history of the Rainbow Bridge. Construction began in January 1987. Construction began in January 1987 with the aim of creating a bridge that would connect the center of Tokyo with the Rinkai subcenter, which was to be built at the time, and provide both convenience in terms of transportation and aesthetically pleasing scenery in order to relieve traffic congestion in the center of Tokyo.

The bridge is known as a beautiful suspension bridge with a length of 798m, but there is a reason why it became a suspension bridge. The bridge was built for a reason: ships using the Port of Tokyo needed a space 50 m high and 500 m wide for navigation under the bridge. In addition, the height of the bridge was limited to 155 m due to the presence of Haneda Airport nearby. The requirement to curve the road at both ends also imposed various restrictions on the length from the main tower to the anchorage (the block used to fix the main cable of the suspension bridge). As a result of satisfying all of these conditions and taking economic and technical considerations into account, the suspension bridge format was adopted.

At the time of the Rainbow Bridge construction, I was working as an editorial reporter for the Nikkan Jidosha Shimbun newspaper on the coast of Minato Ward, and for several years I watched the bridge being completed while taking breaks at Hinode Pier, located just a short distance from my office. It is quite moving to think that it has been 30 years since the bridge opened to traffic.

At that time, the nickname “Rainbow Bridge” did not yet exist, and was simply called the “Tokyo Port Liaison Bridge. The name “Rainbow Bridge” was chosen from a public contest, but the name was not made public until November 1992. Mikiko Ishii, a world-renowned lighting designer, was in charge of the lighting, and I recall her saying, “It was difficult to design the lighting for a bridge whose name had not even been announced. It was not until 2000, seven years after the opening of the bridge, that the beautiful rainbow-colored lights that have become synonymous with the bridge came to be used.