Japan · Niigata-ken · Niigata
Bandai, Niigata — Area Guide & Where to Stay
Bandai is a district of Chuo ward in Niigata built on ground filled during the Shinano river works, and now one of the two commercial centres of the city.
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Where to stay in Bandai
Where visitors usually base themselves, and why.
Bandai City is the reason to be here. The shopping complex beside the Niigata Kotsu bus centre fills the first chome, and it was built from the early 1970s on the site of the company's old bus depot. It sits between two centres.
Bandai lies about halfway between the Bandai exit of Niigata station and the Furumachi district, on the axis the city calls its two kilometres. Hotels stand in the fifth and sixth chome.
About Bandai
What are the main landmarks in Bandai?
The Niigata Nippo Mediaship rises twenty storeys. It opened in the spring of 2013 at the crossing on the Tokoh line, holding the newspaper's head office along with cultural facilities, public space and tenants. Bandai City anchors the first chome.
Niigata Alta, Lovela Bandai and Lovela 2 stand around the bus centre, and Lovela Bandai was redeveloped by Mitsui Fudosan after Daiei withdrew. Two streets have been given over to walkers. The Galveston-dori and the Bandai City street are designated as roads for pedestrian convenience.
What is the history of Bandai?
The land was filled during the river works. Engineers reworked the Shinano below the Okozu diversion channel in the early Showa era, and the fill above the Bandai bridge on the right bank, together with the ground at the eastern end of the bridge, is what the district stands on. The name came in 1968.
The address reform of that year turned part of Ryusakuba and other ground into Bandai one to six chome. Buses made the centre. Niigata Kotsu redeveloped the site of its old depot from the early 1970s and built Bandai City on it, which was called the new city centre of Niigata against the older Furumachi.
Planning caught up later. The district was named one of three priority areas in the town-centre revitalisation plan of 2008, and the city's master plan of the same year treats the Bandai area as one of its centres.
Where is Bandai?
Bandai lies in Chuo ward in Niigata on the right bank of the Shinano at the eastern end of the Bandai bridge, bordering Bandaijima, Sanwacho, Higashi-Bandaicho, Higashi-Odori, Benten and Yachiyo.
More areas in Niigata
Updated September 2026