is a district of

Kobe Kobe ( , ; officially , ) is the capital city of Hyōgo Prefecture Japan. With a population around 1.5 million, Kobe is Japan's seventh-largest city and the third-largest port city after Tokyo and Yokohama. It is located in Kansai region, whic ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

. It is one of the major downtown areas in the city. The name of Shinkaichi means "newly opened area". It was named so because the district was really newly developed after moving the Minato-gawa (river) from this area to the west end of the city in the early 20th century. Before

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

and the air raid on Kobe by the Allied forces in 1945, this district was the largest section of downtown Kobe. From the 1920s to the 1940s, this district was also famous as a "town of

theater Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actor, actors or actresses, to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. The p ...

s". However, after such theaters lost their popularity during the 1960s, this district rapidly lost its status.

Transportation

Shinkaichi Station is a railway station operated by Hanshin Electric Railway Co., Ltd., Hankyu Corporation and Kobe Electric Railway Co., Ltd. in the district of Shinkaichi, Hyogo-ku, Kobe opened on April 7, 1968. Kobe Rapid Transit Railway Co., Ltd. owns the ...

Kobe Rapid Transit Railway Kobe ( , ; officially , ) is the capital city of Hyōgo Prefecture Japan. With a population around 1.5 million, Kobe is Japan's seventh-largest city and the third-largest port city after Tokyo and Yokohama. It is located in Kansai region, whi ...

is in Shinkaichi. It is the terminal of the trains of

Kobe Electric Railway , often called , is a Japanese private railway company in Kobe and surrounding cities. It is a subsidiary of Hankyu Hanshin Toho Group. Lines * Arima Line ( Minatogawa - Arima Onsen is an onsen, or hot springs in Kita-ku, Kobe, Japan. This ...

and is also served by

Hankyu , trading as , is a Japanese private railway company that provides commuter and interurban service to the northern Kansai region and is one of the flagship properties of Hankyu Hanshin Holdings Inc., in turn part of the Hankyu Hanshin Toho Group ...

Hanshin , derived from the second kanji from and the first kanji from (but in ''on''-reading instead of ''kun''-reading), refers generally to Osaka, Kobe, and the surrounding area in the Kansai region of Japan. In the context of a region of Hyōgo ...

and

Sanyo , stylized as SANYO, is a Japanese electronics company and formerly a member of the Fortune Global 500, ''Fortune'' Global 500 whose headquarters was located in Moriguchi, Osaka, Moriguchi, Osaka prefecture, Japan. Sanyo had over 230 subsidiari ...

trains. {{Shopping districts and streets in Japan Shopping districts and streets in Japan Tourist attractions in Kobe Geography of Kobe