There are some section of a train line where 4 stations are owned by someone else and they change names along the same rail route. They also change the driver or whatever he is called when changing the company name of the train.
How Japan's railways stayed one while splitting apart
61–70 of 158 posts
Re: How Japan's railways stayed one while splitting apart
#62The U.S had the greatest rail network and then we built the Interstate Highway system and abandoned rail. Truth is that nobody funds multiple competing transportation network. Japan chose rail, we chose highways.
Rail is great when you have a lot of people or things moving on the same path. Highways are great when everyone has a different path. Japan has most (but not all) of its large destinations on the pacific coast, which works great for rail. I'm sure passenger rail networks used to have more routing options than amtrak does now, but it's hard to get between a lot of places by rail without going through Chicago. In the w…
Air is exactly the same but there are connections to everywhere from Kansas or Montana or wherever. I really think the rail situation in the US is primarily lack of investment. And it sucks; even here in Chicago where the connections are plentiful, the schedules and frequency are awful.
Re: How Japan's railways stayed one while splitting apart
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
Rail is great when you have a lot of people or things moving on the same path. Highways are great when everyone has a different path. Japan has most (but not all) of its large destinations on the pacific coast, which works great for rail. I'm sure passenger rail networks used to have more routing options than amtrak does now, but it's hard to get between a lot of places by rail without going through Chicago. In the w…
Air is exactly the same but there are connections to everywhere from Kansas or Montana or wherever. I really think the rail situation in the US is primarily lack of investment. And it sucks; even here in Chicago where the connections are plentiful, the schedules and frequency are awful.
Air travel is easier to make work because most of the infrastructure is at the airports, not on the routes. Airlines can change routes easier than railroads. The speed of air travel has natural utility. Commercial airplanes come in many sizes... Turboprops can reasonably service small airports that can't fill a 737. Once daily or even a few times a week service from a middle of nowhere airport to a hub opens you up to a lot of destinations with 1 stop, and a 2nd stop (maybe with a different airline) probaly gets you to anywhere you want to go.
With small airports, there's probably plenty of flight time is worse than drive time and security and rental counter time add up too, so flying isn't always less time than any other mode, but often it is.
Re: How Japan's railways stayed one while splitting apart
#64Earlier quoted context omitted.
Although Japan also has extensive highways, and they're privatized in a similar way to JR (NEXCO East, West, Central) and are nearly all tolled - if you're driving alone, it's often the same price in tolls alone as a ticket on the Shinkansen (but the equation quickly flips when you more people in the car)
This is a big difference with much of the U.S. and Europe, Japan doesn't subsidize car ownership as heavily. There is no on-street parking in the city, businesses aren't required to provide parking and if you want to own a car you first have to prove you have a parking space for it.
You do some heavy assumptions about European nations
Re: How Japan's railways stayed one while splitting apart
#65For those of you planning to go to Japan, please make sure you actually calculate how much JR train trips would cost you. They upped the price a few years ago and, since then, it's basically impossible for the JR Pass to be more affordable than single tickets. For one of my recent trips, I was actually more better served with a local pass (Kansai Wide Pass) than the JR Pass. Too bad because it used to be a really goo…
> Too bad because it used to be a really good deal...
Considering the environmental woes & collapses coming down the pike, I'd like to see a trans-border effort to drive down the price of mass transit _everywhere_. Put it on the G7 agenda, the OECD agenda, the UN General Assembly agenda, ...
Re: How Japan's railways stayed one while splitting apart
#66For those of you planning to go to Japan, please make sure you actually calculate how much JR train trips would cost you. They upped the price a few years ago and, since then, it's basically impossible for the JR Pass to be more affordable than single tickets. For one of my recent trips, I was actually more better served with a local pass (Kansai Wide Pass) than the JR Pass. Too bad because it used to be a really goo…
> Too bad because it used to be a really good deal... Considering the environmental woes & collapses coming down the pike, I'd like to see a trans-border effort to drive down the price of mass transit _everywhere_. Put it on the G7 agenda, the OECD agenda, the UN General Assembly agenda, ...
Trains can use renewable energy.
Re: How Japan's railways stayed one while splitting apart
#67It's always frustrating to read anything by most foreigners about Japanese trains. There are around 100 train companies in Japan. JR is 7 of those 100. The other 93 are NOT JR. Drawing any conclusions about Japanese trains from inspecting 7% of them is just wrong. The title, "How Japan's railways stayed one" is just false. They were never one, they are still not one. Take Tokyo, off the top of my head there is Toei,…
Tech industry needlessly idolizes the country, so you're unfortunately bound to read this slop until the heat death of the universe.
Its because deep down they know japan has something which they destroyed with there ideology and hate in there own country.
Re: How Japan's railways stayed one while splitting apart
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
The decaying rural areas of Japan would probably love to be stuck in the 80s if they can. Too late, now they have hollowed out and everyone young is moving to the same cities most tourists stay at. Every time you read a story about some Japanese town offering people, even foreigners, money to move there and occupy an abandoned house, keep in mind this is a gesture of desperation, not gratitude,
Additonally, most foreigners who would comment on HN or Reddit are earning significantly higher than the average Japanese or even Tokyoian.
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Re: How Japan's railways stayed one while splitting apart
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
Tech industry needlessly idolizes the country, so you're unfortunately bound to read this slop until the heat death of the universe.
Its because deep down they know japan has something which they destroyed with there ideology and hate in there own country.
"which they destroyed with there ideology and hate in there own country"
Arguably the ideology and hate are prerequisites for a country to have a monoculture. With ideology and hate comes xenophobia and racism == monoculture.
Re: How Japan's railways stayed one while splitting apart
#70The U.S had the greatest rail network and then we built the Interstate Highway system and abandoned rail. Truth is that nobody funds multiple competing transportation network. Japan chose rail, we chose highways.
Although Japan also has extensive highways, and they're privatized in a similar way to JR (NEXCO East, West, Central) and are nearly all tolled - if you're driving alone, it's often the same price in tolls alone as a ticket on the Shinkansen (but the equation quickly flips when you more people in the car)
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