Transport minister Chikage Ogi pledged Thursday that her ministry will do everything it can to minimize the financial burden from the Haneda airport expansion project on local governments in the Tokyo area.
Ogi made the comment at a news conference after meeting with governors of Tokyo, Chiba and Kanagawa prefectures in the first session of a joint council on the Haneda airport expansion project. The vice governor of Saitama Prefecture and mayors of Chiba, Yokohama and Kawasaki also attended.
Local governments have expressed unanimous opposition to shouldering the financial burden of the project, although they support the idea of turning Haneda into an international airport.