MY HOST FAMILY IN JAPAN.....THANK YOU.....

It was a long day...22 hours traveling with lay overs in Seattle Washington.. Flew out of Kansai Airport

 Stayed at The New Miyako Hotel in Kyoto from July 1st - July 4th

1. 
   

   New Miyako
2. Accommodation

   • Lists

   

   Boasting a prime location within a two-minute walking distance from Hachijoguchi exit of "Kyoto Station" - the gateway to the ancient capital of Kyoto - the New Miyako Hotel offers an ideal base and various package plans for leisure and business travelers.

   Restaurants & Bar

   • Lists

   

   The hotel provides an array of dining and drinking options including a stylish dining café & bar, a buffet-style restaurant serving over 100 different dishes, an authentic Sichuan restaurant and a Japanese restaurant specializing in Kyoto cuisine.

   Banquet & Meeting

   • Lists

   

   The New Miyako Hotel offers a splendid atmosphere for memorable occasions such as conferences, reunions, and anniversary parties.

   Facilities

   • Lists

   

   The hotel has ample facilities for the convenience of hotel guests and event participants, including a business center, courier service counter and the shopping mall "MIYAKO Avenue", with Kyoto souvenir shops, clothing and accessory stores, and a convenience store.

   Local Attractions

   • Lists

   

   Experience a slice of some of Kyoto's top seasonal attractions including famous ancient temples and shrines. 

   Access

   • Lists

   

   Boasting a prime location within a two-minute walking distance from Hachijoguchi exit of "Kyoto Station" - the gateway to the ancient capital of Kyoto.

   In the 1960s, when the Kansai region was rapidly losing trade to Tokyo, planners proposed a new airport near Kobe and Osaka. Osaka International Airport, located in the densely populated suburbs of Itami and Toyonaka, was surrounded by buildings; it could not be expanded, and many of its neighbors had filed complaints because of noise pollution problems.

   After the protests surrounding New Tokyo International Airport (now Narita International Airport), which was built with expropriated land in a rural part of Chiba Prefecture, planners decided to build the airport offshore. The new airport was part of a number of new developments to revitalize Osaka, which had lost economic and cultural ground to Tokyo for most of the century.^[9]

   Initially, the airport was planned to be built near Kobe, but the city of Kobe refused the plan, so the airport was moved to a more southerly location on Osaka Bay. There it could be open 24 hours per day, unlike its predecessor in the city.

   Construction[edit]

   
   

   

   Satellite photo of Kansai Airport (lower-right island) in Osaka Bay. Kobe Airport is being built on the unfinished island near the middle of the photo. Central Osaka is in the upper-right corner, along with Osaka International.

   
   

   

   Closeup of the artificial island

   An artificial island, 4 km (2.5 mi) long and 2.5 km (1.6 mi) wide, was proposed. Engineers needed to overcome the extremely high risks of earthquakes and typhoons (withstorm surges of up to 3 m (10 ft)).

   Construction started in 1987. The sea wall was finished in 1989 (made of rock and 48,000 tetrahedral concrete blocks). Three mountains were excavated for 21,000,000 m³(27,000,000 cu yd) of landfill. 10,000 workers and 10 million work hours over three years, using eighty ships, were needed to complete the 30-metre (98 ft) layer of earth over the sea floor and inside the sea wall. In 1990, a three kilometer bridge was completed to connect the island to the mainland at Rinku Town, at a cost of $1 billion. Completion of the artificial island increased the area of Osaka Prefecture just enough to move it past Kagawa Prefecture in size (leaving Kagawa as the smallest by area in Japan).

   The bidding and construction of the airport was a source of international trade friction during the late 1980s and early 1990s. Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone responded toAmerican concerns, particularly from Senator Frank Murkowski, that bids would be rigged in Japanese companies' favor by providing special offices for prospective international contractors,^[10] which ultimately did little to ease the participation of foreign contractors in the bidding process.^[11] Later, foreign airlines complained that two-thirds of the departure hall counter space had been allocated to Japanese carriers, disproportionately to the actual carriage of passengers through the airport.^[12]

   The island had been predicted to sink 5.7 m (19 ft) by the most optimistic estimate as the weight of the material used for construction compressed the seabed silts. However, by this time,^[when?] the island had sunk 8.2 m (27 ft) - much more than predicted. The project became the most expensive civil works project in modern history after twenty years of planning, three years of construction and several billion dollars of investment. Much of what was learned went into the successful artificial islands in silt deposits forNew Kitakyushu Airport, Kobe Airport, and Chūbu Centrair International Airport. The lessons of Kansai Airport were also applied in the construction of Hong Kong International Airport.^[13]

   In 1991, the terminal construction commenced. To compensate for the sinking of the island, adjustable columns were designed to support the terminal building. These are extended by inserting thick metal plates at their bases. Government officials proposed reducing the length of the terminal to cut costs, but architect Renzo Piano insisted on keeping the terminal at its full planned length.^[14] The airport opened in 1994.

   On 17 January 1995, Japan was struck by the Kobe earthquake, whose epicenter was about 20 km (12 mi) away from KIX and killed 6,434 people on Japan's main island ofHonshū. Due to its earthquake engineering, the airport emerged unscathed, mostly due to the use of sliding joints. Even the glass in the windows remained intact. In 1998, the airport survived a typhoon with wind speeds of up to 200 km/h (120 mph).

   On 19 April 2001, the airport was one of ten structures given the "Civil Engineering Monument of the Millennium" award by the American Society of Civil Engineers.^[15]

   As of 2008, the total cost of Kansai Airport is $20 billion. This includes land reclamation, two runways, terminal and facilities. Most additional costs were initially due to the island sinking, expected due to the soft soils of Osaka Bay. After construction the rate of sinking was considered so severe that the airport was widely criticized as a geotechnical engineering disaster. The sink rate has since fallen from 50 cm (20 in) during 1994 to 7 cm (2.8 in) in 2008.^[16]

   
   

   Checked out of the hotel on the 4th took a Limousine bus service to

    Kansai International Airport..

   

   
   

   

   
   

   

   
   

   

   
   

   

   
   

   

   
   

   

   
   

   

   
   

   

   
   

   

   
   

   

   
   

      

   Arrived in Seattle at 10:30 lay over  3 hours to Detroit plane boarded at 1;15 took  off at 1:50 got to Detroit at 8:50PM   HOME SWEET HOME
   
   

   
   

   Search Results