Fukushima holiday village proposed to tap fascination with disaster

In the exclusion zone around Japan's crippled Fukushima nuclear plant, where most people see a contaminated wasteland that will be uninhabitable for generations, Hiroki Azuma sees opportunity.

Azuma, a philosopher and cultural critic, has gathered a team of eight experts in various fields and proposed a plan to create a new community on the edge of the exclusion zone that will become a centre for tourists wanting to visit the epicentre of the second-worst nuclear disaster in history.

Azuma believes that the Fukushima plant, destroyed in the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami, can become one of the world's most popular "dark tourism" destinations.

"The basic idea for the project came about after seeing the transformation of the area around the Chernobyl nuclear power plant into a tourist area," Azuma said.

Visitors would be able to stay at hotels in the new community - given the tentative name of Fukushima Gate Village - which would also have restaurants, shops and a museum telling the story of the disaster and the impact it has had on the lives of local people.

There are also plans for the village to have research facilities dedicated to developing renewable energy resources.