Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Why Japan has such good railways

worksinprogress.co

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

561–570 of 609 posts

Re: Why Japan has such good railways

#561

Post by acdha »

doikor wrote: post #381
acdha wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sometimes it’s privately subsidized, too, such as when you go out to eat and your meal costs more because the restaurant provides free parking. People who don’t drive often pay higher prices subsidizing the people who do, which is something we should talk about more directly.

A lot of the time the businesses don’t have an option to not have parking as it is enforced by zoning laws/regulations. Though they can make that mandatory parking paid but often the social norm is for it to be free (at least for the first hour or two)

Yes, the line between public and private policy is blurry but I think our society would’ve gone down a very different path if car drivers were expected to directly pay for what they use as much as transit riders are.

Re: Why Japan has such good railways

#563

Post by phire »

kinow wrote: post #533
phire wrote: post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The railway services NZ are trying to bring back are regional commuter services. Auckland to Hamilton (now in operation); Auckland to Tauranga; Wellington to Palmerston North (Capital Connection, has been in operation for 35 years, about to be upgraded to battery-electric trains, since only half the route is electrified). And also the vague idea of local rail service around Christchurch (interestingly, a private comp…

I remember the announcement some years ago of the Auckland-Hamilton train. I think initially it had limited schedule, but from what I recall the usage was quite good after the launch (I think it was before or just after the pandemic). Good to know it's in operation now. > And also the vague idea of local rail service around Christchurch (interestingly, a private company bought the old DMUs from Auckland's local fleet…

I agree that if you put a high-speed line between Auckland and Wellington, and get the travel time down to 3-4 hours, people would use it. It would actually be faster than going to the airport for central Auckland, or anything further north.

But high speed lines are expensive, and NZ just doesn't have anywhere near the population density to justify it.

As for night trains, I'm pretty sure they can only exist where they are bridging multiple viable day train routes. Which is why that huge gap between Hamilton and Palmerston North is an issue.

And the route might actually be a bit short for a night train. If they electrified the entire distance (instead of using a diesel the whole way despite the fact 80% of the route is electrified) and did some improvements, they could probably get it down to an 8 hour trip.

> What about options for those living up north?

TBH, I'm not a fan of Auckland and don't really know what's going on with local public transport.

Re: Why Japan has such good railways

#564

Post by frollogaston »

linzhangrun wrote: post #315

[flagged]

The thing I still don't get is, US cities were populated long before autos were ubiquitous. How did this not cement public transport? The most famous case is how Los Angeles's Pacific Electric rail company ("Red Car") died off. It's often thrown around that the automobile industry made that happen through lobbying, but when I dug into it, their decline started in the 1920s, well before autos were common and LA had its big freeways like the 405.

I'm guessing it's just a population density thing. Cause supposedly the Red Car was a loss-leader for real estate development from the start.

Re: Why Japan has such good railways

#565

Post by frollogaston »

mmooss wrote: post #172
antonymoose wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an American, I always hear all these weird stories about New York and its subway system. All the random busker type nonsense, the petty crime and the “mugger wallet” type jokes. Not to mention the major crimes that make the news. I’d rather not deal with it? Yes I know roads are dangerous. I’d still rather not deal with the expected culturally imposed insanity that the Japanese curiously seem to lack.

> I always hear all these weird stories The weird stories, about anything, are nonsense; sensationalized to either be emotoinally compelling or even active disinformation to serve some political end (especially about American cities, especially about NYC.) It's just induced fear. Just go to NY and ride the subway. Millions do all the time without any problems, without a second thought. It's really no problem and amaz…

Those stories would be accurate on BART in San Francisco. I used to ride that every day to/from work and at other times. The non-rush-hour times were the worst actually.

I've never lived in NYC, but from visiting, their subways seem safer (and also work much better).

Re: Why Japan has such good railways

#566

Post by rayiner »

bradchris wrote: post #345
rayiner wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Culturally, though, it’s because that over half of the population doesn’t know that they would benefit from trains No it’s not. Everyone in America goes to Disney World, which was made by a train nerd and you can’t even drive into the parks. Everyone goes there, rides around the trains and walkable areas, and then goes home to Ohio and drives around in their giant SUV. It’s not because people don’t know about train…

That’s fun, because I’m from a third generation Dallas family :) I hope they enjoy Dallas and all Texas has to offer. Dallas, TX has continually voted in expanding its DART Rail funding the past 40 years. It has the most miles of intercity rail in the entirety of the South. It has the most light rail, by mileage, built in the entirety of the US. It just opened up an entirely new rail line through the suburbs (and onl…

> So please forgive me if I say that you are incorrect in both your assessment of how the majority of Dallas, Texas supports rail and your assumption of what I value.

I'm correct in my assumption about what you value. But you're correct in your assumption about what other people value.

> People will use what is most convenient, immigrant or not — most people (including me) do not take trains out of some principled stance, they do so when it’s more convenient.

Right, and virtually nobody in the Dallas, Texas area actually takes transit themselves. The proof of what they value is right there in their revealed preferences.

Re: Why Japan has such good railways

#567

Post by itsmek »

rootusrootus wrote: post #523
yulker wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing that is critical is that the country hasn't turned home ownership into an ever growing financial asset that is meant to carry the majority of one's wealth into perpetuity

Unfortunately that does not seem to have helped them keep housing affordable. Looks just as bad as anywhere else.

Source? I've always thought of Tokyo as a rare example of abundant and affordable housing among major world cities. Their rent to income ratio is like 0.3 while most major global cities are 0.35-0.4

Re: Why Japan has such good railways

#568

Post by Mawr »

gnabgib wrote: post #546
rsynnott wrote: post #542

Earlier quoted context omitted.

California has a similar population density to France, which has a generally decent railway network. It's not really an excuse.

France has a density (pop/km²) of 122, similar density countries include Poland, Azerbaijan, Sierra Leone, Egypt (how are consistent are the rail systems across those countries?). US has a density of 37. California specifically has a density of 94 (29% lower), which puts it near Spain, Timor-Leste, Moldova and Cuba.. California is doing OK for it's position. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_depende…

People aren't uniformly distributed over entire areas, making such comparisons completely wrong and pointless.

> US has a density of 37.

Just LOL. No, the US does not consist of 300 million people evenly spread over that large of an area. Not even close.

Re: Why Japan has such good railways

#569

Post by pjc50 »

kulahan wrote: post #556
bamboozled wrote: post #428

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it rough when a house costs 10-20x less than in countries where the best you can reasonable hope for is a whopping 10% return on your money?

10% is the bog-standard minimum, so you're more hoping for 12-15%, and the houses in Japan are knocked down and rebuilt between essentially every occupant, so they're pieces of garbage meant to last a decade or so, and about as environmentally unfriendly as one can get. So yeah, it's extremely rough when there's nothing valuable to invest your money in.

Where on earth are you getting 15% on real estate and over what time period?

Re: Why Japan has such good railways

#570

Post by Tiktaalik »

SenHeng wrote: post #473
Tiktaalik wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are other aspects beyond simply being more permissive. I recall reading for example that property transfer tax is remarkably less on bare land, enough so that when travelling in Japan you will regularly notice bare lots for sale, as it is beneficial for the seller to tear down a lot before they sell it. This sort of thing encourages churn of housing, and coupled with liberal zoning, enables an accelerated incre…

Property taxes on land zoned for residential use are 6x more expensive if left bare. That’s why Japan has an akiya plague, because even a dilapidated building will keep taxes down. I couldn’t find a more general article so here’s an example from a generic small town council. https://www.city.inagi.tokyo.jp/en/faq/kurashi/1001633/10016...

You're right. I'm not sure how I got mislead or misremembered the dynamic here. I thought there was a specific clear tax benefit but doesn't seem so.

There are tax benefits for new buildings for a limited time so maybe that's what I was thinking about and became confused.

Post reply on HN