Former Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Koji Matsui won the Kyoto mayoral campaign Sunday with promises to tackle the city’s over-tourism problem, with his ideas including a new fare system for public transport that would make bus and subway rides cheaper for residents but more expensive for visitors.

But in order to implement that idea, there needs to be a change in the national law, and how effective the plan would be in easing travel congestion for local residents is still unclear.

Matsui — who ran without official party endorsement but was backed by the Liberal Democratic Party and Komeito, as well as the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan and Democratic Party for the People — will succeed Daisaku Kadokawa, who has been mayor since 2008. He won with 177,454 votes, while his main challenger, Kazuhito Fukuyama, who had unofficial support from the Japanese Communist Party, garnered 161,203 votes. Voter turnout was 41.67%, about one point higher than four years ago.

“I have experience as a bureaucrat, a politician, and as a university teacher, so I thought I knew Kyoto to a certain extent. But this was a really tough campaign, although because it was tough, I was able to hear the frank opinions of many residents,” Matsui said following his victory.

He has worked as an industry ministry bureaucrat, a Democratic Party of Japan lawmaker and as a policy management professor at Keio University.

Matsui faces many hurdles, and he takes over at a time when the negative effects of over-tourism on Japan’s former capital have become a particular topic of concern for residents. Kyoto had over 43.6 million tourists in 2022, more than double the previous year when COVID-19 restrictions were in place. This figure includes 576,000 foreign visitors, including foreign residents in Japan.

In October 2022, Japan relaxed its border controls that had been put in place due to COVID-19, and since then the number of foreign visitors has been increasing.

While the increase in tourists means more money for the local economy, it also means crowded buses and subway stations, traffic jams, long lines at Kyoto’s famous temples and shrines, and garbage in the streets, leading to complaints and calls for action by many local residents.

Matsui promised to tackle the over-tourism problem in a number of ways, including by calling on the central government for legal revisions that would allow Kyoto buses and the subway system to charge visitors higher fares, while charging residents lower fares than what they are at the moment. Currently, the fares are the same for everyone.

The purpose of the system would be to give priority to the transportation needs of local residents and discourage overcrowding of buses and subways by tourists.

To reach many of Kyoto’s famous tourist destinations, the cheapest option is usually the city bus system. It has many stops along the way that are used by local residents, who find themselves trying to board jam-packed buses with tourists, sometimes unsuccessfully.

This prompted Matsui to also propose a specialized sightseeing bus route for tourists. He also wants there to be discussions on restricting the entry of private cars into the city by nonresidents during the holiday season, in the hope of reducing traffic congestion.

In addition to transportation issues, Matsui plans to deal with the problem of littering by introducing “smart” garbage cans.

“When these smart bins become full, an electronic signal is sent to the city’s waste management bureau, which comes and collects the garbage. These collection boxes are quite expensive and the system is being implemented with the help of corporate donors. So spreading their use in major Kyoto city tourist spots is a major issue” Matsui said.