Attraction
In 1604 the shogunate established Nihonbashi as the point from which distances on the Tōkaidō, Nakasendō, Kōshū Kaidō, Ōshū Kaidō, and Nikkō Kaidō were reckoned. That designation made the bridge an administrative origin rather than the literal beginning of every journey. Couriers, domain processions, merchants, pilgrims, and ordinary travelers entered networks whose stages, posts, documents, and costs were organized from Edo. A National Road Origin Marker is embedded at the bridge's center today, with a replica accessible at the bridgehead. The modern marker continues the symbolism of national distance while belonging to a later road system, not the seventeenth-century street surface.
