In the warring-states age, a warrior who served Oda Nobunaga built a castle in this basin and opened a grid-plan castle town at its foot. When that castle town was laid out, a water vein was drawn into the streets, and because its spring water was used even for the lord’s cooking, it was revered and called “Oshozu,” the pure water. More than four hundred years on, that water still wells up. This town, called the Little Kyoto of Echizen, is losing population gently. Ono-shi’s numbers are the record of a town inscribed with a grid-plan castle town and the springs of the castle town.
A city in the east of Fukui Prefecture, opening out in the Ono Basin ringed by mountains. The population has fallen gently and steadily, from 38,880 in 2000, through 35,291 in 2010, to 31,286 in 2020. What I (Atlas) want to read here is not the sign “a town of famous water,” but the causal thread: how the history — the grid-plan castle town and the springs of the castle town — is translated into today’s population and finances.
01 · See the present Ono-shi in its numbers
In the latest Population Census the population is about thirty-one thousand (31,286 in 2020). Its course is a gentle but steady decline. From 38,880 in 2000, through 37,174 in 2005, 35,291 in 2010 and 33,109 in 2015 to 31,286 in 2020, it lost more than seven thousand over twenty years.
Looking inside the figures, the figure of a mountain-valley castle town contracting appears. The share aged 65 and over rose from 24.2% in 2000 to 37.3% in 2020, drawing near four in ten. The household-with-children share was 21.5% in 2020, and the Childcare Waitlist was zero in both 2024 and 2025. The Fiscal Capacity Index was 0.42 in fiscal 2023 — a level whose own tax revenue covers only a little over four-tenths of expenditure, with a large reliance on the local allocation tax. The numbers show the town where the castle-town water vein still wells up losing population gently and deepening in age. Why it takes this shape cannot be read without going back over the history of the castle town and its springs.
Source: Population Census (Statistics Bureau, MIC) / Local Government Finance Survey, Fiscal Capacity Index (MIC) / Childcare Facility Status Report (Children and Families Agency) / Real Estate Information Library (MLIT)
02 · The grid-plan castle town, the springs of the castle town, the Little Kyoto of Echizen — the history behind the numbers
This town’s skeleton is set by a grid-plan castle town opened in the warring-states age and by the springs that watered that castle town. What set the skeleton was the castle. In the warring-states age, a warrior who served Oda Nobunaga was charged by Nobunaga’s command with quelling a regional uprising of an armed religious league, advanced into this basin from the neighboring province, and built a castle on a mountain within the basin. When the surrounding castle town sinks into a sea of cloud and the castle alone is seen to rise above it, it is also called the castle in the sky. This warrior opened, at the foot of the castle, a castle town laid out in a grid. Because that orderly townscape is carried on to this day, this town is also called the Little Kyoto of Hokuriku.
And what watered this castle town was the water. When the castle town was laid out, the underground water vein was drawn into the streets and upheld the living of the people. Because that spring water was used even for the lord’s cooking, it was revered and called “Oshozu,” the pure water, and “Daimyo Shimizu,” the lord’s pure water. This spring was later selected among the nation’s famous waters, and more than four hundred years on it still wells up within the streets. The basin terrain stores the snow and rain that fell on the surrounding mountains underground, and it springs up here and there in the castle town — this circulation of water has upheld the living of the castle town. A grid-plan castle town, in which the castle-town water vein wells up — this town’s shape stands upon the history of a castle town and its springs that the geography of a basin ringed by mountains took in.
Source: Echizen Ono Castle (Kanamori Nagachika built the castle on Mt. Kameyama around 1576; the castle town laid out as a grid; the “castle in the sky” — overview) / Oshozu Spring (spring water drawn into the urban area when the castle town was laid out; selected among the 100 Famous Waters in 1985; the “Daimyo Shimizu” — overview)
03 · In the town where the castle-town water vein wells up, the population falls gently
What characterizes Ono-shi is that, while holding the history of a grid-plan castle town and the springs of the castle town, as a mountain-valley basin town it has lost population gently but steadily. From 38,880 in 2000 to 31,286 in 2020, it lost more than seven thousand over twenty years. The siting of a basin ringed by mountains raised a distinctive castle town and water culture, but it also holds a side that lies far from large cities and is hard for new workplaces to be drawn into. The younger generation moving to urban areas in search of work or higher schooling, the town can be read as having contracted gently. That the share aged 65 and over reached 37.3% in 2020, drawing near four in ten, is one expression of that population composition.
On the other hand, the Childcare Waitlist was zero in both 2024 and 2025. A Fiscal Capacity Index of 0.42 is a level whose own tax revenue covers only a little over four-tenths of expenditure, with a large reliance on the local allocation tax. As a mountain-valley basin castle town, it mirrors the limit of its own tax source. The population has gone on falling by more than seven thousand over twenty years, aging draws near four in ten, and the finances cover only a little over four-tenths on their own. Even so, the waitlist is zero, and the castle-town water vein still wells up more than four hundred years on. The vessel of a basin holds at once the contraction and the unchanging circulation of water — Ono’s numbers mirror both.
Source: Population Census (Statistics Bureau, MIC) / Local Government Finance Survey, Fiscal Capacity Index (MIC) / Childcare Facility Status Report (Children and Families Agency)
04 · In the castle town that Nobunaga’s retainer built, a four-hundred-year water vein still wells up
Ono carries to this day the castle that Nobunaga’s retainer built in the warring-states age, and the grid-plan castle town he opened at its foot. Because the orderly townscape is carried on, it has been called the Little Kyoto of Hokuriku. And the underground water vein drawn into the streets when that castle town was laid out, used even for the lord’s cooking and so revered, still wells up within the streets more than four hundred years on.
The basin ringed by mountains stores the snow and rain that fell underground, and lets it well up here and there in the castle town. This circulation of water, unlike a factory that moves at a firm’s judgment, does not leave this land. The layout of the castle town that Nobunaga’s retainer drew, and the water vein drawn at that same time, stand side by side in the same place across four hundred years. The grid-plan town layout, and the spring water the lord drank — the mountain-valley basin goes on drawing up to the present, from beneath its feet, those two things unchanged since the warring-states age.
Source: Echizen Ono Castle (Kanamori Nagachika built the castle on Mt. Kameyama around 1576; the castle town laid out as a grid; the “castle in the sky” — overview) / Ono City (city status in 1954 through the merger of Ono town and others; the Little Kyoto of Echizen; a castle town of springs and a morning market — overview)
05 · Atlas note — in the town where the castle-town water vein wells up, what is it that does not move
A population falling gently and steadily, an aging rate of 37.3%, a household-with-children share of 21.5%, fiscal capacity of 0.42. Lay out Ono’s indicators and the numbers of a mountain-valley castle town contracting come together. What I (Atlas) want to read here is the link between this steady population decline and the siting of a basin. A basin ringed by mountains raised a distinctive castle town and water culture, but it lies far from large cities and is hard for new workplaces to be drawn into. Should the younger generation move to urban areas in search of work or higher schooling, the town contracts gently. The largeness of the reliance on the allocation tax, at a fiscal capacity of 0.42, can also be read as the obverse of the siting constraint — that it is hard to draw into the basin an industry thick enough to fatten the town’s own tax source.
But beside the contracting numbers there is something that has not moved for more than four hundred years. The layout of the castle town that Nobunaga’s retainer opened in a grid in the warring-states age, and the spring water drawn into the streets at that time and said to have been used even for the lord’s cooking. Unlike a factory that moves at a firm’s judgment, the circulation of water by which the basin stores snow and rain underground and lets it well up does not leave this land. The population falls, aging draws near four in ten, and the finances cover only a little over four-tenths on their own — yet the castle-town water vein wells up today in the same place as four hundred years ago. The thing that goes on falling, and the thing that cannot fall. The vessel of a basin holds both beneath its feet, and crosses one more snow season.
Source: Population Census (Statistics Bureau, MIC) / Echizen Ono Castle (Kanamori Nagachika built the castle on Mt. Kameyama around 1576; the castle town laid out as a grid; the “castle in the sky” — overview) / Oshozu Spring (spring water drawn into the urban area when the castle town was laid out; selected among the 100 Famous Waters in 1985; the “Daimyo Shimizu” — overview)
Editor’s note: all figures and sources are drawn from official statistics. The prose follows Atlas’s voice, and AI (atlas-handcrafted-reverse-v1 (Daiki 2026-06-02)) handled the shaping of the text. Evaluative or predictive language (such as “a good buy” or “attractive”) is intentionally left out. Revision id: wave15_4