Title:   TMT for Subaru/Gemini's Future
Author(s): M.Iye, H.Takami, T.Usuda, T.Yamashita, H.Akitaya, 
N.Kashikawa, W.Aoki, M.Imanishi, N.Takato, T.Yamada and ELT supporters

Abstract: 
NAOJ is planning to join the Thirty Meter Telescope project to exploit 
its observational capability for the Subaru community. The Group of 
OPtical InfraRed Astronomers issued a resolution to support this plan 
in March 2007 and the Advisory Committee for the Optical/Infrared 
Astronomy issued a recommendation to NAOJ in March 2008.  NAOJ Director 
Shoken Miyama and the TMT Board Director Henry Yang signed the Memorandom 
of Understanding to promote TMT project in Nov. 2008. The Japan Academy 
of Science is drafting a recommendation due in May 2009 and TMT site 
will be decided in July 2009.

NAOJ is preparing to submit a preparatory budget for the fiscal year 2010, 
assuming that the TMT site will be Mauna Kea. Main budget request starting 
from 2011, when the construction budget for ALMA will become much smaller, 
can be submitted one year later if everything goes smoothly.

Although the current plan is an optimistic one, the possibility of 
realizing the first light of TMT at Mauna Kea in 2018 is tantalizing to 
the Subaru /Gemini community, especially considering the enhanced survey 
capability of Subaru prime focus provided by HSC and possibly also by WFOS 
and the associated time exchange programs organized between the Subaru and 
the Gemini telescopes.