One Year On, Legoland Japan Boosting Efforts to Increase Visitors

May 6, 2018

Nagoya- Legoland Japan is redoubling efforts to increase the number of visitors as the outdoor theme park is apparently fighting an uphill battle about a year after its opening.

The theme park in the city of Nagoya, the capital of Aichi Prefecture, opened on April 1, 2017, with much fanfare, mainly targeting families with children aged between 2 and 12.

It has more than 40 attractions for children and allows visitors to play with Lego interlocking toy bricks.

Legoland Japan has been touted as a major tourism resource in the Chubu central Japan region in and around Aichi. Before its opening, there had not been large-scale theme parks in the region, such as Tokyo Disney Resort in Chiba Prefecture, part of the Kanto eastern region, and Universal Studios Japan in the city of Osaka in the Kansai western region.

Only two months after the opening, however, Legoland Japan carried out effective fee cuts, in response to complaints that its one-day passport prices were too high.

The operator of Legoland Japan said in mid-September last year that the number of visitors had topped one million. Since then, the company has not announced whether the theme park achieved its first-year goal of attracting two million visitors.

As part of efforts to increase visitors, the operator opened Legoland Japan Hotel, which includes an aquarium on the first and second floors, in front of the theme park on April 28 this year.

But some critics say the theme park needs to introduce facilities attractive to adult visitors. Legoland Japan "has been unable to appeal to adults," said an official of the Chubu Region Institute for Social and Economic Research, a think tank in Nagoya. Jiji Press