Tokyo, a bustling metropolis of about 8.5 million, is the most densely populated city in the world. Including the greater metropolitan area, it's the most populous, ahead of Mexico City and New York's 17 million each - there are a total of about 28 million people, out of Japan's 126 million, living in just 2% of Japan's land area.
The 8.5 million of Tokyo's City inhabitants live in an area just 616 square kilometres (about 233 square miles). Government centre is in the Shinjuku ward's massive modern office towers (pictured). Note the old-versus-new of the temple in the foreground.
There are various figures bouncing around about real estate prices in Tokyo - in the late-1980s, it was worked out that the land the Imperial Palace sits on in centreal Tokyo was worth the same as the land in California (yes, the whole STATE, including L.A. and San Francisco!)
Costly, it is... and with the threat of earthquakes, architecture is not as modern as it might be in other major cities - earthquake biulding code regulations impose limits on height & type of building.
But it nevertheless manages to capture the imagination of the traveller - where old meets new, business meets religion, and a long, culturally rich heritage makes for an impressive visit.
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