The average value of land that faces major roads across Japan increased by 10 percent from the previous year, reaching 143,000 yen a square meter, the National Tax Agency announced on Tuesday.

It was the third-straight year of rises in roadside values, which are used for calculating inheritance and gift taxes, the agency said.

While the rate of increase in the roadside value in major local cities was higher than the previous year, the rate decreased in the three major cities of Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya. This indicates that the so-called "mini bubble" of skyrocketing real estate prices may be subsiding.

The highest roadside values increased in 25 major local cities where their prefectural governments are located. The figure was up by five compared to the previous year. Among them, the rate of increase in roadside values was up by 5 or more percentage points from the previous year in Sendai, Saitama, Chiba, Gifu, Shizuoka, Tsu and Kumamoto.

On the other hand, the rate of increase in roadside values for the nation's three major cities shrank by 5.7 percentage points for Tokyo, 2.4 percentage points for Osaka and 10.5 percentage points for Nagoya.

The average roadside values in Japan had been on the decline since 1992, following the burst of the bubble economy. A sign of recovery appeared in 2005, when roadside values started to rise in Tokyo. The rising trend continued for the nation's average roadside values by 0.9 percent in 2006 and 8.6 percent in 2007.

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