Niigata City Aquarium Marinepia Nihonkai, Public aquarium in Chūō-ku, Niigata, Japan
Niigata City Aquarium Marinepia Nihonkai displays marine creatures from the Sea of Japan arranged across multiple floors with viewing corridors and tank displays. The building features a large dolphin tank alongside various exhibition sections for different ocean inhabitants.
The aquarium opened on 22 October 1967 in Sekiya, Chūō-ku, on the former site of the Niigata Expo, as Niigata Municipal Aquarium. It moved about 300 m east to the former Niigata Beach Center site and reopened on 27 July 1990 under its current name. A major renovation closed it from September 2012 to 15 July 2013.
The nickname "Marinepia Nihonkai" is a coined word combining the English "MARINE" and "UTOPIA". The aquarium also breeds Humboldt penguins and succeeded in breeding Commerson's dolphins four years in a row from 2019 to 2022. It has a friendship agreement with Aquamarine Fukushima, signed on 23 November 2007.
The aquarium sits in Nishi-Funami-cho, Chūō-ku, about 300 m west of the site of the old 1967 building. The grounds hold a free car park for 640 vehicles. By public transport, the Niigata city sightseeing loop bus stops at Suizokukan-mae; on the C2 Hamaura-chō line, the C22 runs to that terminus, while the more frequent C20 and C21 stop at Okamoto-kōji, an 8-minute walk away.
The nickname Marinepia combines the English words MARINE and UTOPIA into the coined term MARINEPIA. The aquarium also breeds Humboldt penguins and, from 2019 to 2022, succeeded in breeding Pacific white-sided dolphins four years in a row.
The community of curious travelers
AroundUs brings together thousands of curated places, local tips, and hidden gems, enriched daily by 93,355 contributors worldwide.
