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The Asahi Shimbun
National Report
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THE ASAHI SHIMBUN
March 11, 2025 at 07:00 JST
An English-language flier posted inside a car rental office in Fujiyoshida, Yamanashi Prefecture (Yusui Munekata)
Tourists flock to the city of Fujiyoshida in Yamanashi Prefecture for the picture-perfect vistas of nearby Mount Fuji.
But while Fujiyoshida and other parts of Japan are being visited by increasing numbers of inbound tourists, there has also been a growing number of traffic accidents caused by foreign drivers in rental cars.
Poor safety awareness due to differences in traffic rules is cited in many cases.
Measures are being taken in these popular tourist destinations to overcome language barriers and help non-Japanese visitors gain a better understanding of local traffic rules.
In Fujiyoshida, the prefectural police’s Fujiyoshida Police Station produced a flier in English last spring calling on inbound tourists to drive safely, asking car rental agencies and tourist information centers to display it in their offices.
The flier shows illustrations for stop signs, while also explaining that pedestrians are given priority at crosswalks and that drivers are required to call the emergency 110 number when they are involved in an accident.
According to prefectural police, the number of property damage accidents caused by foreign tourists in rented cars in the jurisdiction of the police station totaled 216 in pre-pandemic 2019. But the figure rose by around 3.5 times to 770 in 2024.
In many cases, these foreign drivers were involved in single-vehicle accidents in which they hit curbstones, walls or other objects.
Local residents have also raised concerns to the police station and the city government.
The police station also produced fliers in Chinese, Korean and Thai in December last year and intends to distribute them to inbound travelers.
Similar educational efforts are being made elsewhere.
On Feb. 4, members of the Hokkaido police were at a venue of the Sapporo Snow Festival in the city’s Odori Koen park, which was filled with visitors from around the world.
They called on inbound tourists to practice traffic safety in English, Chinese and Korean.
The officers handed out foreign-language fliers to alert foreign tourists who rent vehicles of the dangers of snow-covered roads and inform them of the traffic laws in Japan.
There were 8,743 accidents involving injuries in Hokkaido in 2024.
In 21 of these, or about 0.2 percent, inbound tourists were held most responsible for causing the accidents.
The Hokkaido police painted “STOP” in English on the road near stop signs in 2017 for the first time in the country.
The police also produced a YouTube video featuring clips of past accidents on snow-covered roads, which is available in multiple languages.
DIFFERENT TRAFFIC CULTURE
According to the Institute for Traffic Accident Research and Data Analysis, there were 57 accidents in Japan in 2023 in which foreign travelers on short-term visits driving rental cars were deemed most responsible.
The institute analyzed in depth accidents caused by foreign drivers in rental cars who visited Japan for sightseeing and entertainment purposes during the five years until 2018.
The result showed that there were 66 such accidents a year on average, indicating that foreign drivers were at a significantly higher risk of causing accidents than Japanese drivers.
Compared to Japanese and foreign residents, many of them caused “right-turn accidents,” in addition to intersection collisions.
In a right-turn accident, a car turning right collides with a car going straight in the opposite lane in a country where cars drive on the left side of the road.
It is possible that they failed to confirm safety at intersections.
By prefecture, Okinawa and Hokkaido accounted for about 80 percent of the accidents.
There were many cases of right-turn accidents in Okinawa, while intersection collisions and rear-end accidents were frequently reported in Hokkaido.
Possible causes include inability to understand Japanese, differences in traffic rules and culture and ignorance of local traffic environments and circumstances.
The institute pointed out that it is helpful to raise awareness on traffic safety and provide information appropriate for areas where foreign tourists rent cars.
The All Japan Rent-A-Car Association calls on foreign drivers to be vigilant when driving in Japan, sharing tips in English, Chinese, Vietnamese and other languages on parking rules, how to respond in the event of an accident and other situations on its website.
(This story was written by Yusui Munekata, Yuka Suzuki and Yoichiro Kodera.)
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