Center Gai is the pedestrian street that runs from the Scramble Crossing into the heart of Shibuya’s youth district, officially renamed “Basketball Street” in 2011 by a council that hoped to clean up its reputation and found nobody used the name. It was the home turf of the gyaru subculture in the 1990s and remains a corridor of fast fashion, karaoke towers, arcades, ramen counters and the screens and speakers that make Shibuya loud.
Walk it once for the energy, then use it as a gateway. The streets branching off to the north hold the record shops of Udagawacho, Tower Records’ nine floors sit at the top, and the Dogenzaka side has the clubs. It is not a destination so much as the spine of one.
Tips
- The multi-floor arcades are good for rhythm games and crane machines; cash out 100-yen coins at the changers inside
- Turn into the side streets toward Udagawacho for the record shops, including Manhattan Records and Disk Union
- Weekend nights it is the most crowded street in the city; weekday afternoons it is half empty