They are scenes few would associate with Japan’s highest peak: human traffic jams, foothills littered with garbage and inappropriately attired hikers — some attempting the ascent in sandals. But these sights are all too familiar for Miho Sakurai, a veteran ranger who has patrolled the slopes of Mount Fuji for the past seven years. “There are definitely too many people on the mountain at the moment; the numbers are much higher than before,” says Sakurai. When Mount Fuji was added to the list of UNESCO World Heritage sites in 2013, the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS), UNESCO’s advisory organ, urged mountain officials to manage the crowds. However, the number of visitors to the mountain’s popular fifth hiking station has more than doubled from 2 million in 2012 to over 5 million visitors in 2019, according to the Yamanashi prefectural government. And since the annual climbing season opened just a couple of months ago in July, around 65,000 hikers have reached the summit, an increase of 17% from 2019. Officials say a post-COVID tourism boom has brought thousands more to the mountain, which straddles Japan’s Yamanashi and Shizuoka prefectures. And as Mount Fuji marks the 10th anniversary of its UNESCO designation this year, they fear the environmental situation has reached a “critical point.” “Overtourism — and all the subsequent consequences like rubbish, rising CO2 emissions and reckless hikers — is the biggest problem facing Mount Fuji,” says Masatake Izumi, a Yamanashi prefectural government official. Of Mount Fuji’s 10 hiking stations, the fifth (called “Gogome”) is located roughly halfway up the 3,776-meter mountain. It receives 90% of the mountain’s visitors, most of whom take buses, taxis and EV cars from Tokyo along the Fuji Subaru Line mountain road. Built almost 60 years ago amid Japan’s era of motorization, the Fuji Subaru Line gave visitors and families direct access to a point halfway up the mountain. Izumi, the Yamanashi official, says visitors can no longer take private cars up to the fifth station unless they are fully electric, but that has resulted in more buses ferrying large groups of visitors to the station. The hordes of hikers are also putting the mountain’s limited toilet facilities and four medical stations under increasing pressure, he adds. At the busy fifth station, as busloads of hikers swarm toward the Yoshida trail — the most popular of the mountain’s four routes — Tomoyo Takahashi, a Mount Fuji conservation fund employee, urges them to donate 1,000 yen (US$7) to keep the mountain clean. “It’s like Disneyland here as there are too many people,” she says. (SD-Agencies) Words to Learn 相關詞匯 【橫跨】 héngkuà straddle exist on each side of something 【運輸】 yùnshū ferry transport people or goods in a vehiclelly regularly and often 很少有人會把這些景象與日本最高峰聯系在一起：人流擁堵、垃圾遍地、徒步旅行者衣著不得體 —— 有些人穿著涼鞋來登山。 但這些景象櫻井美穗再熟悉不過了，她是一名資深護林員，過去七年來一直在富士山巡邏。櫻井說：“現在來爬山的人肯定太多了，比以前多得多。” 當富士山2013年被列入聯合國教科文組織世界遺產名錄時，聯合國教科文組織的咨詢機構 —— 國際古跡遺址理事會就曾敦促當地官員對人流進行管理。 然而，根據山梨縣政府的數據，前往備受歡迎的第五徒步旅行站的游客人數已從2012年的200萬人增加到2019年的500多萬人，增長了一倍多。 自登山季于7月開始以來，約6.5萬名登山者上了山頂，比2019年增加了17%。 富士山橫跨日本的山梨縣和靜岡縣，官員們表示，新冠疫情之后的旅游熱潮帶來了成千上萬的游客。今年是富士山被聯合國教科文組織指定為世界遺產十周年，他們擔心富士山的環境狀況已經到了“臨界點”。 山梨縣政府官員正武泉說：“過度旅游與之帶來的后果，如垃圾、二氧化碳排放量增加和盲目的徒步旅行者，是富士山面臨的最大問題。 在富士山的10個登山站中，第五站（名 為“五合目”）位于海拔 3776 米的半山腰，90%的游客都是從東京沿富士斯巴魯線乘坐公共汽車、出租車和電動汽車來這里的。 富士斯巴魯線建成于近60年前的日本汽車普及之時，為游客和家庭提供了直達半山腰的通道。 山梨縣官員伊泉說，除非是純電車，否則游客不能再乘坐私家車前往五合目，但這也導致更多的公共汽車將大批游客送到這里。他補充說，成群結隊的登山者也給山上有限的廁所和四個醫療站帶來了越來越大的壓力。 在繁忙的五合目，當一車車的登山者涌向吉田登山道（富士山四條登山路線中最受歡迎的一條）時，富士山保護基金的員工高橋智洋呼吁他們捐出1000日元（7 美元）幫助富士山保持清潔。她說：“這里像迪斯尼樂園，人太多了。”(Translated by Debra) | 