Japan’s aging population is pushing shrinking cities to grapple with a new reality

What does it mean for a town to prepare for its own disappearance?

To find out, one has to look no further than Yubari, a city on Japan’s northern island of Hokkaido.

Yubari, once a prosperous coal town with a population of 120,000, today spans an area the size of Manhattan, but it feels more like the set of a postapocalyptic film. 

Store after store is boarded up. The streets are eerily quiet. A couple of people can be seen in a stretch of five miles, as a family of deer roams freely.

Yubari has become a symbol of what’s to come for many other towns across the country as it grapples with an aging population and economic decline. Now, instead of trying to attract more people, cities like Yubari are just trying to manage their existing populations.

The town’s downfall began when its coal industry collapsed in the 1970s. In an effort to stay afloat, Yubari pivoted to tourism, launching a ski resort and a coal-themed amusement park. But both ventures failed, and by 2007, the city was bankrupt. Its population plummeted to under 10,000 people — less than 10% of its 1960 peak.

For a time, Yubari seemed poised for a revival. In 2011, its 31-year-old Mayor Suzuki Naomichi introduced reforms and injected a sense of hope. But when he left in 2019 to become governor, the city changed course once again.

Today, Yubari is known as the city that is learning how to let go.

A strategy of survival

Atsuya Tsukasa, Yubari’s current mayor, has a different approach. 

At his office in a dimly lit building next to the abandoned ski resort, he explained that his priority is consolidation, not regeneration.

“We’re not focused on attracting new residents,” Tsukasa said. “It’s about making the city more manageable for those who are still here.”

To achieve this, Yubari has merged its three main districts, encouraging residents to move closer to the town center. Public services have been dramatically reduced — only one elementary school remains, and even the local train stopped running in 2019.

For younger residents like 22-year-old Yusaku Suzuki, that was the final straw. Suzuki said he left Yubari as soon as he could and now works in film production in Sapporo, Hokkaido’s largest city.

“Nearly all my childhood friends have done the same,” he said. “We’re all seeking better opportunities in bigger cities.”

With most of its youth gone, Yubari’s average resident is now 65 years old.

Holding onto the past

At Yubari’s bus station, one of the town’s last-remaining communal spaces, a lifelong resident in her 80s, who didn’t want to share her name, was eager to talk about the past.

“Everybody was excited about life,” she recalled of the 1960s when the coal mining industry was still keeping the town afloat.

“There was a real sense that this town had a future.”

These days, she admitted, life in Yubari is frustrating. Most of her friends have either moved away or passed on. Bus services are dwindling, making it increasingly difficult for her to get around — especially since she doesn’t drive.

Yet, like many of Yubari’s remaining elderly residents, she has nowhere else to go.

“We’re just doing our best to survive with what’s left,” she said.

So is her beloved hometown.