Photo/Illutration Workers remove guardrails from the site where former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was shot in Nara on Dec. 19. (Yoshinori Mizuno)

NARA--Work began Dec. 19 to remove the guardrails set up around the site where former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was fatally shot while giving a campaign speech on July 8.

The city discussed with experts about what to do with the site of the shooting.

“We will not keep any tangible thing at the site,” Nara Mayor Gen Nakagawa said on Oct. 4.

As of Dec. 15, the city had received 718 opinions from people about what to do with the site.

There were 542 opinions that supported maintaining a landmark there.

However, most of those opinions came from people who were not residents of Nara city, city officials said.

The guardrails were set up in the middle of a T-junction on the north side of Kintetsu Railway’s Yamato-Saidaiji Station in Nara as if it was an urban “sandbar.”

The Nara city government has been working on a redevelopment project in the area since before the shooting.

Removing the guardrails is part of that project. After removing the guardrails, the city will temporarily set up barricades.

The redevelopment project is expected to be completed by the end of fiscal 2022.

The “sandbar” area will be a road in April of next year. The sidewalks are expected to be widened as well.

Giving priority to traffic safety, the city will set up flowerbeds nearby.

Tetsuya Yamagami, the suspect in Abe’s shooting, has been detained and will be under psychiatric evaluation until Jan. 23.

The evaluation period was until Jan. 10, but the Nara District Public Prosecutors Office on Dec. 19 requested an extension.

The Nara Summary Court granted it the same day.

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