Kitadaito Village

Tunnel mouths open in a phosphate store's wall.

Old Toyo Seito Phosphate Store

Photo by Uehara82 (CC BY-SA 3.0)

01 ／ Nagahagu and Hime-taniwatari

Of the raised coral reef ringing the interior,about 1.5 km in the south is a screen-like cliff.

Photo by Anonymous Powered (CC BY-SA 3.0)

Of the raised coral reef that rings the interior of Kitadaito Island, about 1.5 km in the south is called Nagahagu. At the foot of the cliff, Hime-taniwatari grows very rarely. It was absent from the Ryukyu Islands and regarded as a specialty of Hahajima in the Ogasawara Islands; it was found here in the summer of 1972.

About 1.5 km in the south
1975: national Natural Monument
Hime-taniwatari found in summer 1972

02 ／ Landing Port Site

On an island whose harsh cliffs allowed no landing,it is said to be where people first came ashore.

According to the village tourism guide, this is said to be where people first landed in 1903 to open up Kitadaito Island, long called Ufuagari-jima for its cliffs that allowed no landing. In the early days it was also a port for shipping sugarcane, and part of the track and sleepers down the steep slope to the sea has been restored.

1903: said to be the first landing
Early port for shipping sugarcane
Part of the track and sleepers restored

03 ／ Daitogu Shrine

For phosphate mining, the shrine is said tohave moved from the summit of Ogonyama.

Daitogu enshrines Amaterasu Omikami and has been worshipped as the island's guardian deity for over a century. The village tourism guide records that it first stood where the summit of Ogonyama now is, and that after phosphate ore was found exposed in 1919 it was moved to its present place for mining.

Enshrines Amaterasu Omikami
1919: moved after ore was found exposed
Annual festival on September 22 and 23

Living here

About 360 km east of Okinawa Island, an island village in the Pacific.

about 1,000 people
Rural district town

Kitadaito is a village centered on Kitadaito Island, with no railway. Its gateway is Kitadaito Airport. The village says Ryukyu Air Commuter flies from Naha Airport once a day each way, via Minami-Daito Airport on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. By sea, the Daito Kaiun ferry Daito runs from Naha, with an official crossing time of 15 hours.

People living here: 590people
Area: 13.07km²
Households: 326households
Rent (average for rentals): —
Healthcare: 0 hospitals ／ 1 clinic

Area and habitable land at the same scalee-Stat B1101 / B1103

Children waiting for childcare: —0 nurseries and similar
Home purchase subsidy: —
Average annual temperature: —

These 3 items are waiting on a nationwide data source. We do not fill them with estimates.

Shape

Borders 0 municipalities.

Kitadaito Village in Japan25.946°N 131.299°E

Territory of Kitadaito Village

Boundaries: National Land Numerical Information (N03)

North to south

3.7km

Travel times per leg are not published by the municipality, so they are not shown.

Kitadaito Village isthis kind of town.

01The Old Toyo Seito Phosphate Store was built to store phosphate ore mined on the island, and four rail tunnels run through its stone wall about 40 m long; it became a national Registered Tangible Cultural Property in 2006, and the Kitadaito Island Phosphate Mine Site was designated a national Historic Site in 2017
02The cultural landscape derived from phosphate mining on Kitadaito Island was selected as an Important Cultural Landscape in 2018; around Nishi Port remain facilities such as the mining ground, tramway and slipways, company housing and welfare buildings are still used as homes and guesthouses, and white dolomite cut stone is widely used
03The former Toyo Seito Shimosaka Bathhouse water intake, with a floor of about 500 square meters on a slope and two storage tanks, conveys water use on an island short of water sources, and the main house of the Sueyoshi residence is a remnant of one of the island's earliest housing developments; both became national Registered Tangible Cultural Properties in 2007

If something caught your eye, ask the town itself.

Kitadaito Village official site ↗Wikipedia ↗