Smoking Areas in Kochi 2026: Harimaya Bridge, the Station and Hirome Market

What the ordinance actually covers

Kochi City explains that smoking while walking is "a dangerous nuisance that risks the lit end touching another person's body or clothing", and that the ordinance exists to prevent that harm. The scope is broader than the English name suggests: the city defines the prohibited conduct as smoking, or holding a lit cigarette, in outdoor public places such as roads, parks and plazas — and it explicitly includes smoking while riding a bicycle or a motorcycle (source: https://www.city.kochi.kochi.jp/soshiki/186/arukitabako.html, updated January 19, 2026). Standing still is therefore not an automatic exemption.

• Designated zones since April 1, 2011: around Kochi Station, Otesuji, the central shopping arcade district, and around Kochi City Hall. An enlargeable zone map is published on the city page — check it before you walk.
• Outside the zones, the city asks everyone across the whole city to make an effort not to smoke while walking, and not to litter.
• No penalty is attached. The city states that punishing violators is not the aim of the ordinance.
• Heated tobacco is not subject to guidance or warnings even inside the zones, because it does not use fire — though the city still asks users not to litter and to be considerate.
• Anyone under 20 is banned from entering a smoking area at all, even if they are not smoking (source: https://jyudokitsuen.mhlw.go.jp/point/).

No fine does not mean no rule

Cities such as Chiyoda in Tokyo or Shimonoseki in Yamaguchi collect an on-the-spot penalty for street smoking. Kochi deliberately does not, saying its goal is that "each person keeps to good manners and does not smoke while walking". Visitors sometimes read that as permission. It is not: the conduct remains prohibited inside the zones, and the point of the rule is physical safety in a city where pedestrians pass close to each other — narrow arcade streets, tram stops in the middle of the road, and the crowds of the Sunday market. Judge by whether you could burn someone, not by whether anyone will fine you.

Portable ashtrays, Hirome Market, and indoor rules

On portable ashtrays the city answers carefully: you may stop and smoke using one where the fire can be properly managed and the safety of those around you can be confirmed — but it immediately adds that street smoking risks burns and scorched clothing for the people around you and causes second-hand smoke, and asks you to never smoke in a way that causes nuisance or harm (source: same page). In practice, an indoor smoking room or a designated outdoor smoking area is the safer choice. Hirome Market, the covered food hall in Obiyamachi, states in its official notice that it went entirely non-smoking indoors following the revision of the Health Promotion Act, and that a smoking area is provided at Yosakoi Hiroba on the south side of the building (source: https://hirome.co.jp/notice.php, notice dated February 25, 2021). Arrangements can change, so check on-site signage. Indoors more generally, the revised Health Promotion Act in force since April 1, 2020 makes facilities used by many people non-smoking in principle, with compliant smoking rooms only under set conditions, and schools, hospitals, childcare facilities and government offices non-smoking across the whole premises (source: https://jyudokitsuen.mhlw.go.jp/point/).

To find designated smoking spots in central Kochi or anywhere else in Japan, use the MottoSuitai smoking area map. For how differently municipalities treat street smoking, see street smoking penalties by municipality, and for a general introduction, Smoking in Japan as a Tourist 2026.