akoshi is located on a natural harbor with gentle waves that is well-suited for use as a port, and it has a long history of prospering as a port where ships stopped to wait for wind. Sakoshi was a particularly prosperous port during the Edo period, when traffic there included kitamae-bune traveling along the nishimawari koro and shiokaisen carrying salt from Ako to Kamigata (present-day Kansai) and Edo (present-day Tokyo). Sakoshi’s townscape is organized around the daido, a wide street that leads to the ocean and is lined with buildings including merchant ship traders’ residences, Buddhist temples, and the former Sakoshi-ura Kaisho (a kaisho was a place used for various types of gatherings). Houses are crowded together along the narrow alleys connecting the daido to the edges of the surrounding neighborhood. Because so many buildings remain, the townscape gives visitors a strong sense of Sakoshi’s history as a port that prospered from maritime shipping. The townscape is part of a group of cultural properties designated in May of Heisei 30 (2018) as Japan Heritage and entitled “The Kitamae-Bune Sea Routes”.