Spring in Japan Part 2: After the monster tsunami in Tohoku Region

All areas along the coast line of the Tohoku Region has suffered from the monster tsunami three years ago.  People and towns are slowly recovering from the damages.  We visited Rikuzen Takada in Iwate Prefecture.  What the city is doing is so amazing, that I have to share some photos.

From Tokyo Station we took this nice looking bolt train, Tohoku Sinkansen to North for about two hours. 

This is a photo of a service area in the city of Rikuzen Takada.  This building was used to house restaurants and shops.  The picture of waves on outside of the building was the height to tsunami.  The inside of the building was completely destroyed, and there was a huge pine tree stuck inside.  The coast line of this area had shelter belts of red pine, but they are all gone.

This was a gas station sign.  It indicates the height of the wave of 15.1m (the allow mark).

 I want to show you these photos.  These bridge like structures are belt conveyors.  The most of the city was sitting on waterfront at zero meter sea level.  To avoid future tsunami the city decided to build the new city on 17m of earth.  They are moving mountains from the back of this photo to the low lying areas.  Only Japanese can think of such idea of moving mountains and doing it.  Wow!