Iconic Tokyo fish market shuts after 83 years

Tokyo: Japan's iconic Tsukiji fish market, considered the world's largest, closed its doors permanently on Saturday after 83 years ahead of its relocation next week.

The market's new home on the artificial island of Toyosu in Tokyo Bay will open to the public on October 11, and will be almost twice the size of the former site, reports Efe news.

The relocation of the market, as part of the urban renovation of Tokyo ahead of the 2020 Olympic Games, has been delayed on several occasions due to fears of contamination of the soil of the new facilities.

While the world's largest fish market will be relocated to Toyosu, Tsukiji's current retail market will be renovated into a "gastronomic theme park", according to the Tokyo metropolitan government.

The origin of the market dates back to 1657, when the Tokugawa Shogunate set up a fish market near Sumida River on land reclaimed from Tokyo Bay and called it Tsukiji, which literally means "reclaimed land".

The market was officially renamed Tsukiji fish market in 1884 but was destroyed, along with most of Tokyo, in the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923 and shifted to its current location in 1935.