Kodaira, Tokyo

Kodaira is a city in the western part of the Tokyo Metropolis in Japan, set on the Musashino Terrace near the geographic centre of the metropolis. It had an estimated population of about 195,000 in 2021 on roughly 20.5 square kilometres, which makes it a dense residential suburb. The area was a largely unpopulated stretch of ancient Musashi Province until the Tamagawa Aqueduct made farming possible in the Edo period. The village of Kodaira was created in 1889, the area passed from Kanagawa Prefecture to Tokyo in 1893, and growth followed the 1923 Great Kanto earthquake when universities and housing moved out of central Tokyo. It became a town in 1944 and a city on 1 October 1962. Today it hosts several universities, including Tsuda College and Musashino Art University, a cluster of Seibu Railway and JR East stations, and Koganei Park with the Edo-Tokyo Open Air Architectural Museum.