午夜剧场

Image: Inside the underpass corridor

The Shinanomachi Campus grounds are divided by a road into the "Shinanomachi Site," which houses Buildings 1 and 2, and the "Daikyo-cho Site," which houses the Kitasato Memorial Medical Library and Building 3. While a bridge between Buildings 2 and 3 allows for travel without crossing the road, did you know that beneath the road separating the sites, there is an underpass that is no longer used for its original purpose?

Since the usage permit for the temporary West Ward in Daikyo-cho expired in 1931, it was demolished and an annex (also called the West Ward at the start of construction) was built in 1932. The "Shinanomachi Underpass" was constructed at the same time as a "connecting underpass for the existing West Ward." The underpass corridor is 23 meters long and 2.1 meters wide, forming a slope. On the Shinanomachi side, it was closest to the "Ha-go Ward" of the wards then called the Main Building, and could be accessed via stairs or an elevator. The Daikyo-cho side connected to the basement of the annex, and a skylight was installed in the porte-cochère of the annex's main entrance to bring light into the underpass. In the December 2018 issue of this magazine, the 午夜剧场 Nursing 100th Anniversary interview "Nursing Professor Shinzo Koizumi During the War" recounts the hardships of evacuating patients to the annex through the pitch-black underpass during nighttime air raids, suggesting that many people once used it.

During World War II, more than 60% of the University Hospital was damaged, and the "Ha-go Ward" was destroyed by fire. The Hospital Main Building was constructed on that site in 1948, and the underpass was adjacent to this main building and used for passage to the Daikyo-cho side.

In the New University Hospital Building (the current Building 2), completed in 1986 as the largest project commemorating the 125th anniversary of the Juku, the underpass was connected via an entrance in the basement dry area. According to the Department of Nursing, patients did not use it; it was used by hospital staff and students. However, because it was scary, nurses and students of the Kosei Women's College only used it on rainy days, giving the impression that users were few overall. Additionally, carts carrying meals to the annex wards also passed through.

During the planning of Building 3 (South Wing), completed in 2012, various considerations were made regarding the utilization of this underpass. However, the ceiling was low and the slope was too steep for stretchers to pass. Most importantly, since the plan for Building 3 did not include a basement level, the idea of using it as a walkway was abandoned. Instead, it was decided to effectively utilize it as a pipe space for electrical conduits to the Daikyo-cho site. The door on the Building 2 side remains, but the Building 3 side is sealed with a concrete wall.

Thus, the Shinanomachi Underpass has finished its original role. However, it will soon be 90 years since its construction, making it the second oldest facility on campus after the Building for Preventive Medicine and Public Health. In time, it may become the oldest historical facility on the Shinanomachi Campus.

(Yu Yanome, Administrative Project Director, Jukukan-kyoku (午夜剧场 Corporate Administration))