colorized photos from 1935 Okinawa

A tram pulled by a horse runs on a 9-kilometer section of track between Naha and Itoman

1935 Rickshaws. I wonder, did they simply use human power, instead of horses, due to lack of farm area for horses, lack of food for horses, interest in clean streets where horse crap wouldn't get tracked into homes and businesses, or some other reason? And why did the rickshaw guy not use a bicycle? They obviously existed in Okinawa at the time. (see photo below) or was it the same idiocy that has people using chopsticks instead of spoons and forks when they know about simpler, easier ways to do something, but choose not to, as a culture.

All black and white photos from The Asahi Shimbun archives of daily scenes in Okinawa Prefecture in 1935 are now being colorized in a joint project with The Okinawa Times and a research team at the Tokyo Metropolitan University.

An artificial intelligence program is used for the coloring process, after which Okinawa Times reporter Satoko Yonaha visits the areas where the photos were taken and interviews local residents to get a better feel for the period so the images can later be retouched manually.

The technology for the automatic coloring was developed by a group led by Hiroshi Ishikawa, a professor of computer science at Waseda University.

http://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/AJ201803170034.html