This reminded me acutely of the extent to which the daily lives of many people can depend on just one bridge. The bridge carried pipes that supplied water to the city of Wakayama, where 60,000 households had no running water for a week. 3 collapse of a bridge into a river in Wakayama Prefecture. The primary reason is a shortage of repair funds due to the nation's shrinking population, which translates into less water service revenue. Those extraordinary structures still function today, underground as well above ground, supporting our daily lives.īut their deterioration due to age is a matter of grave concern.Īccording to an Asahi Shimbun report, 40 years is the statutory lifespan of water pipes, but about 17 percent of the existing pipes are now older than that. In truth, Japan's old capital of Edo (modern-day Tokyo) could not have existed in the absence of technology that enabled the installation of an extensive underground network of wooden water pipes. I mean, I had never imagined what life could be like without running water.
That question revealed my lamentable ignorance. When I first gazed at one of those monumental sites, I muttered to myself in awe, “Why on earth did the Romans build such extraordinary structures just to convey water?” Ruins of massive Roman aqueducts, built to supply water to cities from distant sources, still stand today in countries across Europe that were once territories of the Roman Empire.
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