The northwestern side of Honshu lies on the southeastern margin of the Sea of Japan, an area of oceanic crust created by back-arc spreading from the late Oligocene to middle Miocene.

Currently the area is being deformed by contractional tectonics, causing inversion of these earlier basins, forming anticlinal structures.

Most of the lower part of the city of Niigata is built on recent deltaic deposits from the Shinano and Agano rivers, mainly consisting of unconsolidated sand.

Most devastatingly, the pipes of a gasoline tank owned by Showa Shell Sekiyu, located between the airport and the harbor, were also damaged by the shaking.

Gasoline from the tank was brought to the sea surface by the tsunami and underground water released by the liquefaction, and ignited five hours after the earthquake.

[6][7] From eyewitness reports it appears that failure began 70 seconds after the start of the earthquake, suggesting that ground motion was not responsible.

Due to urbanization and modernization in Niigata City and the surrounding area, water pumping quickly increased in 1950, in order to extract water-soluble natural gas in the groundwater.

Since 1959, due to restrictions on the extractions of natural gas and groundwater in the Niigata city area, large-scale land subsidence has lessened.

The bridge itself only sank about 10 cm during the earthquake, but coupled with the aforementioned land subsidence it has sunk a total of 1.2 meters.