A Brick Hall Built for Horses in the Snow
The Asaden Shunko Maintenance Factory (あさでん春光整備工場), formerly the Covered Riding Hall of the 7th Cavalry Regiment, 7th Division (旧陸軍第七師団騎兵第七連隊覆馬場, read oibaba), is a single-storey brick hall at Shunko 3-jo 7-chome in Asahikawa, Hokkaido, dated to the closing years of the Meiji era and listed as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on 20 November 2001.
The Japanese word oibaba means simply a riding ground with a roof over it. In most of Japan that would be a convenience. In Asahikawa it was a necessity. The city sits in an inland basin ringed by hills, and its winters are among the coldest in the country. Cavalry horses cannot be schooled outdoors for months at a stretch under those conditions, and an army that had staked its northern defence on mounted troops could not afford to let them go soft.
The 7th Division was raised at Sapporo in 1896. In 1899 the decision was taken to move it to Chikabumi in Takasu Village, on the edge of what is now Asahikawa, and barracks and administrative buildings went up on a scale the region had never seen. Covered riding halls were among them, put up for each regiment and battalion between the end of Meiji and the early Taisho years. Asahikawa City's own record attributes this building to the 7th Cavalry Regiment and estimates construction at 1912 or 1913. The Agency for Cultural Affairs enters the period as late Meiji. The two are close enough to be describing the same construction campaign, and the discrepancy is worth knowing about rather than resolving.
It is the last one standing. Every other covered riding hall of the 7th Division has gone.
How the Building Works
The registration criterion applied here is the one for buildings that could not easily be reproduced, and the structure explains why. The hall is brick, one storey, gabled, roofed in sheet iron, with a building area of 1,174 square metres. The interior is a single volume of more than a thousand square metres with nothing standing in it. For a horse to be ridden at speed under a roof, there can be no columns in the way.
The span is carried on iron Fink trusses. A Fink truss puts its web members in a repeating V pattern that works the diagonals in tension and keeps the ironwork light for the distance covered, and it was the standard long-span solution of the period. Those trusses land on brick piers stiffened with buttresses, which do two jobs at once: they take the outward thrust of the roof, and they let the wall carry the weight of Asahikawa snow without thickening the whole envelope.
Light and air were the other problem. A riding hall in use fills with dust thrown up from the floor, and horses in an enclosed brick box need ventilation. The answer here is a monitor roof running along the ridge, a raised section with its own openings, supported by dormers set into the roof slope. The result is a wall and roof surface with a great many openings for a building of this date, all of them working.
Brick was chosen for warmth as much as for strength. Laid solid, it stops the draughts that would have made a timber shed useless in February. The building was registered in the thirty-first round of listings under register number 01-0045, gazetted on 4 December 2001.
Visiting: What Is Realistic
This is a working bus depot, not a museum. Asahikawa Denki Kido, known locally as Asaden, uses the hall to service vehicles, and the building is not open to the public as a matter of policy. Do not plan a visit around going inside. What you can do is look at it from the public road, where the long brick flank, the buttresses and the monitor roof read clearly, and where a stone monument marking the site of the 7th Cavalry Regiment stands beside the depot. The city has placed a historical marker board here, though it notes that the lettering has faded and a replacement is being prepared.
The site is in the northern part of the city at roughly 43.803 north, 142.371 east. Photography from the street is a matter of ordinary courtesy rather than permission, but the depot yard is private property and staff are working. Stay outside it.
If the 7th Division is what brings you here, the place to spend real time is the Hokuchin Memorial Museum, a short distance away on the edge of the Ground Self-Defense Force camp opposite Hokkaido Gokoku Shrine. It holds around 2,500 items on the tondenhei soldier-settlers and the 7th Division, admission is free, and it can be entered directly from the public road without passing through a camp gate. Hours are 09:00 to 17:00 from April to October and 09:30 to 16:00 from November to March, with Mondays closed. Buses from JR Asahikawa Station stop at Gokoku-jinja-mae, about five minutes' walk away.
Asahikawa registered a cluster of buildings on the same day in November 2001, among them the seven surviving warehouses of the Kamikawa Soko group by the station, several of which are now public halls and galleries. Pairing those with a look at the riding hall gives a reasonable picture of what the garrison town built and what it did with the buildings afterwards.
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Q&A
- Can the Asaden Shunko Maintenance Factory, the former 7th Cavalry Regiment riding hall, be visited inside?
- No. The building is in daily use as a bus maintenance workshop by Asahikawa Denki Kido and is not open to the public as a rule. The exterior can be seen from the public road at Shunko 3-jo 7-chome, where a stone monument to the regiment also stands.
- What is a covered riding hall, and why did the 7th Division need one at Asahikawa?
- An oibaba is a roofed riding ground. Asahikawa lies in an inland basin with some of the coldest and snowiest winters in Japan, so cavalry horses could not be exercised or schooled outdoors for months at a time. Brick construction kept the draughts out.
- When was the Asaden Shunko Maintenance Factory built?
- The Agency for Cultural Affairs records the period as late Meiji. Asahikawa City estimates construction at 1912 or 1913 and attributes the building to the 7th Cavalry Regiment. Both accounts point to the same building campaign that followed the division's move to Asahikawa.
- What is architecturally significant about the former 7th Cavalry Regiment covered riding hall?
- Iron Fink trusses spanning onto buttressed brick piers create a column-free interior of more than 1,000 square metres, with a monitor roof and dormers providing the ventilation and daylight a riding hall demands. It was registered under the criterion for buildings that could not easily be reproduced.
- Where can I learn more about the 7th Division near the Asaden Shunko Maintenance Factory?
- The Hokuchin Memorial Museum nearby displays about 2,500 items on the soldier-settlers and the 7th Division. Admission is free; hours are 09:00 to 17:00 from April to October and 09:30 to 16:00 from November to March, closed Mondays. Take a bus from JR Asahikawa Station to Gokoku-jinja-mae.
Basic Information
| Name | Asaden Shunko Maintenance Factory, formerly the Covered Riding Hall of the 7th Cavalry Regiment, 7th Division, Imperial Japanese Army (あさでん春光整備工場（旧陸軍第七師団騎兵第七連隊覆馬場）) |
|---|---|
| Location | Shunko 3-jo 7-chome 231, Asahikawa, Hokkaido |
| Designation | Registered Tangible Cultural Property (Structures), register number 01-0045, thirty-first round |
| Year Designated | Registered 20 November 2001; gazetted 4 December 2001 |
| Quantity | 1 building |
| Dimensions | Brick, single storey, sheet iron roof, building area 1,174 square metres |
| Owner | Asahikawa Denki Kido Co., Ltd. |
| Public Access | Not open to the public; in use as a bus maintenance workshop. Exterior visible from the public road |
References
- National Cultural Properties Database, Agency for Cultural Affairs — Asaden Shunko Maintenance Factory
- https://kunishitei.bunka.go.jp/heritage/detail/101/00002498
- Cultural Heritage Online, Agency for Cultural Affairs — Asaden Shunko Maintenance Factory
- https://online.bunka.go.jp/heritages/detail/138268
- Asahikawa City — Designated and registered cultural properties in the city
- https://www.city.asahikawa.hokkaido.jp/kurashi/329/348/353/p000162.html
- Asahikawa City — Historical marker board, former 7th Division covered riding hall
- https://www.city.asahikawa.hokkaido.jp/kurashi/329/348/353/p000216.html
- Hokuchin Memorial Museum, Ground Self-Defense Force 2nd Division — official site
- https://www.mod.go.jp/gsdf/nae/2d/hokutin2/top.html
Last verified: 2026.08.27