In Japan, recently activities of sightseeing have been growing rapidly and so geographical studies on sightseeing and tourism are increasing in number. It is reported that big private railway companies exert their capital powers on development and growth in sightseeing places. We can see some such cases in Nikko-Kinugawa area (in Tochigi pref.), Izu-Hakone area (in Shizuoka pref.), Ise-Shima area (in Mie pref.) and so on.
The author is interested in regional changes caused by the march of capital. So this paper is aimed at the investigation of the march of big private railway companies into famous sightseeing places. The results of this study can be found in the following passage.
Big private railway companies keep many local transport facilities (buses, ropeways, cablecars and boats) in famous sightseeing places under their subjection. Their markets are extended from Hokkaido to Kyusyu. it is a remarkable fact that they have their markets not only in Tokyo, Nagoya, Osaka and Fukuoka, where their main offices and railway and bus lines are located, but also other domestic areas, where middle or small-scale transport companies have been managing before. (Fig 1. 2. 3. 4. Table 2) Particularly 3 out of 14 big private railway companies-Tokyu, Meitetsu and Kintetsu-are positively extending their markets to local areas as largely as possible.
Hereafter this tendency will be remarkable more and more.