Hitachinaka-shi

In the latest Population Census the population is about a hundred and fifty-seven thousand (156,581 in 2020). This city was born in 1994 from the merger of the old Katsuta City and the old Nakaminato City. Because the merger predates this Census’s tabulation, no large step appears in the figures; over twenty years it has moved nearly flat — from 151,673 in 2000, through 153,639 in 2005, 157,060 in 2010, 155,689 in 2015, to 156,581 in 2020. Amid regional cities losing population, this is a rare and stable curve.

Looking inside the figures, youth and stamina stand out. The share aged 65 and over, at 25.7% in 2020, stays at a quarter, and the household-with-children share, at 21.8%, is high. The Childcare Waitlist has been zero in recent years. The Fiscal Capacity Index was 0.90 in fiscal 2023 — close to one, which means a stamina rare for a regional city, covering most of expenditure with its own tax revenue. This city, in which an industrial town and a fishing-port town became one, holds its population and bears a markedly high fiscal stamina. The reason does not come into view without going back over the history of the industry of Katsuta and the port of Nakaminato.

Hitachinaka’s skeleton is set by the history of two lands of differing character becoming one. The inland old Katsuta City developed in the modern era as an industrial city where firms centered on Hitachi, Ltd. gathered. The seaward old Nakaminato City held a fishing port opening onto the mouth of the Naka River, made fisheries its main industry, and was a seaside town with a bathing beach. In 1994 this industrial town and this fishing-port town merged to become Hitachinaka City. In economic geography it is a form in which urban functions of differing character coexist within a single municipal area.

On its seaward side one more old history remains. At Nakaminato there is the site of a reverberatory furnace built, at the close of the Edo era, by Tokugawa Nariaki, the ninth lord of the Mito Domain, to cast Western-style cannon to deal with the foreign ships appearing off Japan’s coasts. The cannon cast here are said to have been placed at coastal batteries in various places. As the front line of coastal defense, this port stood at the entrance of the modern era.

And in the present age, the agglomeration of inland industry remains a thick pillar of the town’s economy. Manufacturing, beginning with Hitachi, Ltd., has sustained the places of work and the tax source. An industrial town and a fishing-port town became one, the shore keeps the site of the reverberatory furnace, and the agglomeration of industry sustains the town. Inland industry and a Pacific fishing port — two originally separate towns — coexist within a single municipal area.

What characterizes Hitachinaka-shi is that, amid many regional cities losing population, it has held a nearly flat population over twenty years. That the share aged 65 and over stays at a quarter and the household-with-children share exceeds two in ten can be read as the expression of the inland agglomeration of industry still giving stable places of work and holding young households. The seaside fishing port and bathing beach, as a core of tourism, also bring a different flow of people to the town.

That thickness of industry shows strongly in the fiscal figures. A Fiscal Capacity Index of 0.90 is close to one — a level covering most of expenditure with its own tax revenue, rare and high for a regional city. Manufacturing, beginning with Hitachi, Ltd., can be read as generating this thickness of the tax source. The Childcare Waitlist too has moved at zero in recent years. This city, in which an industrial town and a fishing-port town became one, now holds the stability of its population and its youth, and a markedly high fiscal stamina, all at once. A flat population, shallow aging, markedly high finances — regional cities where these three align are not many even looking across the whole country. The double addition by which inland industry generates employment and the tax source, and the seaside fishing port and bathing beach add a different flow of people, is the true identity of that stability.

In Hitachinaka the faces two towns brought overlap. One is the history of the inland agglomeration of industry centered on Hitachi, Ltd., bearing the origin of a town of firms that the old Katsuta City built. Another is the fishing port and bathing beach at the mouth of the Naka River, keeping the character of a seaside town that the old Nakaminato City held. And the site of the late-Edo reverberatory furnace gives this town’s shore the memory of having been the front line of coastal defense.

A Hitachi-affiliated industrial city and a fishing-port town became one in 1994, and the shore keeps the site of the reverberatory furnace. The geography of holding an agglomeration of industry inland and opening a fishing port onto the Pacific has overlaid two towns of differing character within a single municipal area. Whether one sees the inland where Hitachi-affiliated plants line up, or the shore where bathing beaches and the fishing port spread — which face one calls to mind first, under the same city name, divides by what one comes to this town seeking.