Tateyama Snow Corridor / Yuki-no-Otani was added to Your Favorites!
Chubu-Sangaku NP, Toyama
Claim this place to tell your story your way.
The Murodo plateau averages about 6 m of mid-April snow, but winter winds pile it into a drift on Otani’s sheltered side of a ridge. Snow here reaches 15–20 m; clearing 500 m of road reveals the towering wall.
The wall’s stripes preserve clues to winter weather: clear ice bands signal thaw or rain, dark bands contain soot carried by seasonal winds from cities and industrial areas, and tan bands hold dust blown across Asia.
The wall is carved, not piled up: GPS-guided pilot plowing marks the buried road, then 2 bulldozers shave down the snow side by side. Rotary blowers cannot throw snow over walls this high, so the cut takes precise teamwork.
The first Snow Wall Walk took place on April 26, 1994, after visitors asked to walk beside the wall. With only 1 lane cleared, early walks were brief and timed; 2-lane clearing in 2000 made room for freer walking.
A route-clearing snowblower is nicknamed Tateyama Kumataro, after the bear in Tateyama’s mountain-opening legend. During Snow Wall Walk season, this working machine is displayed at Murodo—where visitors can meet the bear behind the name.
The 500-m corridor is one slice of a much bigger spring effort: 22 machines clear 31.3 km of mountain road, starting in early February and working for about 2½ months to prepare for the route’s opening.
