Editor’s Note: This story originally appeared in Volume I of B.H. Magazine. Subscribe here.
Tokyo’s blinding lights, cultural quirks, and millions of inhabitants scurrying the metropolis like ants in a sandhill can overwhelm even the most seasoned of travellers.
Looking for an edgy record bar? Take your pick from hundreds. A ten-course omakase in the backstreets of Shinjuku? I’ve got you sorted. How about a window into the soul of Japan’s mythical car scene? That one’s a little trickier.
Just days before my first-ever trip to Tokyo, I heard murmurs of a place called Daikoku. It’s a highway rest stop on an artificial island 45 minutes south of the city in Yokohama, on the fringes of Japan’s industrial coastline. There’s nothing notable around it for miles. No taxis or public transport will take you there, and why would they?
Home to maybe a hundred car parks, a handful of convenience shops, and a halo of ring roads soaring above it in all directions, Daikoku Parking Area is one of the most forgettable places in Tokyo.
This would all be true if it weren’t for Japan’s humming car culture. In the depths of Reddit and die-hard car blogs, Daikoku has another life that is as close to Tokyo Drift as any foreign rev head may ever get. But that’s if you can get there.
By chance, a loose friend, who is Japanese, replied to an Instagram story of mine after I arrived asking if I needed any local hookups. I took a punt with my reply: “Have you ever heard of Daikoku?”
Twenty minutes pass with no response before I find myself thrust into a WhatsApp group, unannounced, with my broker and a mystery woman named Amanda. She gets straight to the point.
“I’ll take you to Daikoku, how’s Friday at 9:30pm?”
With one mutual connection and a single profile picture to bank on, I duck out of dinner early and follow Amanda’s instructions for our late-night rendezvous. At this point, the evening could go any number of ways — everything from a blind date to a kidnapping.
A blacked-out Porsche pulls up to the curbside of Nogizaka Street subway station and a young, bubbly woman smiles at me as the window rolls down. Half American, half Japanese, and with a piercing gaze. Somehow I am more confused than I was before. What was Amanda doing taking a stranger to a car meet on a Friday night? As it turns out, she just really loves cars and frequents Daikoku quite a lot.
“It’s just as likely you’ll be treated to as many special appearances on a Saturday morning as you would a Tuesday night.”
Daikoku Parking Area isn’t nearly as nefarious or unholy as the grapevine would like to suggest. In reality, its edginess lies in the mission it takes to get there. Visitors must be prepared to roll the dice on what they’ll see on any given day, and at any time of day. In fact, it’s just as likely you’ll be treated to as many special appearances on a Saturday morning as you would a Tuesday night. Luckily for me, Amanda says our Friday night flurry is the best she’s ever seen.
Daikoku’s car meets are hall-of-fame worthy in Japanese automotive culture. For more than 30 years, hotted-up wheels have revved and turbo-whistled their way through its gates, descending on the unassuming spot at all hours of the day and night.
Legend has it, Daikoku was once a magnet for the Mid Night Club – Japan’s infamous street racers – well before visions of Han’s RX-7 glamourised the scene in Hollywood. Active throughout the early ’90s, the group’s members were known only to each other on a first-name basis and you had to have a car capable of more than 250 km/h to qualify. They dominated the Wangan highway route between Tokyo and Yokohama after hours. So much so that it eventually became a popular playground for iconic Japanese tuners and their ludicrous machines. Daikoku was where they warmed up and cooled down.
Today, it’s a pick-n-mix of local and European automobiles, from the iconic to the unexpected, that somehow coexist with little effort. Eighties and nineties JDM heroes rub shoulders with immaculate restomods, Alpina-badged BMWs, American muscle, sleeper saloons, and rare supercars, both old and new – each enviable in their own way. There’s nothing exclusionary about it, nor is it organised or owned by any particular group. Your ticket for entry is a love of cars. That, and the vehicle required to get there.
We step out of the Porsche to a completely packed scene; things have well and truly kicked into gear for the weekend’s prime time. An R34 Nissan GT-R in its iconic electric-blue spec waits for its owner a few bays down. They’ve wandered off to ogle at something that has just pulled in; so menacing and low to the ground that it is hard to see behind the pews of parked cars. All I can see is an outrageous rear wing and a crimson glow from underbelly lights illuminating the tarmac around it.
More than half a dozen 992 Porsche 911 Turbos in whacky hues, everything from lime green to dark purple, are lined up like Skittles, in perfect colour-wheel order. If I wasn’t a kid in a candy store already, my senses really begin to redline when I spot the underbite of a vicious Mercedes-Benz 190E 2.5-16 Evolution II poking out from a lineup. In its heyday, this German beast was literally a DTM racer for the road. It is one of many sets of wheels that are a long way from home, but interestingly enough, none of them look out of place under the Friday night lights of Daikoku.
The clock ticks closer to midnight and there is a looming sense that a Cinderella moment is coming. Funny business can be heard happening on the overpasses above us – a Datsun 240Z shredding its tyres in a fishtail, perhaps – and the symphony of engines idling in the parking area starts rumbling louder by the minute.
The cops also notice this change in mood and respond instantly by lighting up the area on all sides, barking announcements over a loudspeaker in Japanese. The place is surrounded.
A glance in Amanda’s direction and her nod confirms that the public parking area is now closed – it’s time to leave. With one road in, and one road out, the police have essentially triggered a final showdown at the car park’s exit to the highway on-ramp, which spirals back up to the road overhead. Despite the evening’s frivolities being cut short, it is nothing but beaming smiles from all who’ve descended on Daikoku tonight.
All image credits to Mark Riccioni (Instagram: @mark_scenemedia).
