Japan Mass Transit & Infrastructure 日本の公共交通機関とインフラ

[loefet]

Maybe, but using a robot is way cooler

[Momo1435]

Tama Monorail around Tachikawa

[bains1971]

Nice pictures thanks.

[rmcee]

how fast does the Tama monorail system run?

[Momo1435]

The maximum speed is 65 km/h.

[Momo1435]

Some Keisei and Tobu trains.

[japanese001]

[castermaild55]

Originally Posted by Momo1435

The maximum speed is 65 km/h.

[Norbb]

Sorry for this kind of question:
While browsing through google maps, I wondered if there is some understanding of Tôkyô/Ôtemachi/Nijûbashimae as some sort of "Greater Tôkyô Station"?

-

To take one step further, with a Tokyo Metro ticket it should be possible to get from Ôtemachi Station through Nijûbashimae, (Yûrakuchô) to Hibiya - even as far as Ginza and Higashi-ginza by foot.
Even if this is an extreme exaggeration (as there is propably not a single person that would transfer from the Asakusa line at Higashi-ginza by foot), but even only as far as Hibiya this should be in theory the largest interconnected station complex that I am aware of at the moment.

[sesliu]

Originally Posted by Momo1435

Shibuya Community Bus "Hachiko"
http://www.city.shibuya.tokyo.jp/eng/com_bus/index.html



cute

lol

[quashlo]

It’s definitely a candidate for the largest interconnected railway station complex… At least in Japan, I think the only station that could possibly top it is Shinjuku / Shinjuku Sanchōme / Shinjuku Nishi-guchi / Seibu Shinjuku. After that would probably be Ōsaka / Umeda / Nishi-Umeda / Higashi-Umeda / Kita-Shinchi and Namba / JR Namba / Ōsaka Namba / Kintetsu Nipponbashi / Nipponbashi. It would be hard to say definitively, though, because of the hazy lines between what’s part of the station, part of an attached underground retail arcade, part of an adjacent building, just a pedestrian subway, etc.

Regardless, here’s my quick rundown of what the complex would be like:

• Tōkyō Station
  • JR Tōkaidō Line
  • JR Chūō Line (rapid)
  • JR Yamanote Line
  • JR Keihin-Tōhokū Line
  • JR Yokosuka Line
  • JR Sōbu Line (rapid)
  • JR Keiyō Line
  • JR Shinkansen (Tōkaidō, Tōhoku, Yamagata, Akita, Jōetsu, Nagano)
  • Tōkyō Metro Marunouchi Line
• Ōtemachi Station
  • Tōkyō Metro Marunouchi Line
  • Tōkyō Metro Tōzai Line
  • Tōkyō Metro Chiyoda Line
  • Tōkyō Metro Hanzōmon Line
  • Toei Subway Mita Line
• Nijūbashi-mae Station
  • Tōkyō Metro Chiyoda Line
• Hibiya Station
  • Tōkyō Metro Hibiya Line
  • Tōkyō Metro Chiyoda Line
  • Toei Subway Mita Line
• Ginza Station
  • Tōkyō Metro Ginza Line
  • Tōkyō Metro Marunouchi Line
  • Tōkyō Metro Hibiya Line
• Higashi-Ginza Station
  • Tōkyō Metro Hibiya Line
  • Toei Subway Asakusa Line
• Yūrakuchō Station
  • JR Yamanote Line
  • JR Keihin-Tōhokū Line
  • Tōkyō Metro Yūrakuchō Line

If we break it down by operator / line:

• JR East (7)
  • JR Tōkaidō Line
  • JR Chūō Line (rapid)
  • JR Yamanote Line
  • JR Keihin-Tōhokū Line
  • JR Yokosuka Line
  • JR Sōbu Line (rapid)
  • JR Keiyō Line
• Tōkyō Metro (7)
  • Tōkyō Metro Ginza Line
  • Tōkyō Metro Marunouchi Line
  • Tōkyō Metro Hibiya Line
  • Tōkyō Metro Tōzai Line
  • Tōkyō Metro Chiyoda Line
  • Tōkyō Metro Yūrakuchō Line
  • Tōkyō Metro Hanzōmon Line
• Toei Subway (2)
  • Toei Subway Asakusa Line
  • Toei Subway Mita Line
  Total: 16 lines
  Plus JR Shinkansen (Tōkaidō, Tōhoku, Yamagata, Akita, Jōetsu, Nagano)

Interesting to note is that seven of the nine Tōkyō Metro lines serve this complex… That whole area is kind of a mess, partly because of the virtual “hole” from the Imperial Palace Grounds, which means that all the lines have to skirt the perimeter. What’s even more interesting is that the number of lines (16) will definitely increase by up to three once the Utsunomiya Line, Takasaki Line, and / or Jōban Line are brought in, and could increase further with the proposed Tsukuba Express extension and Asakusa Line Bypass line.

[Norbb]

Massive! Tokyo Monorail might join up as well, as I read they are considering extension to Tôkyô Station.

I added up the daily entrance numbers (half of the total commuter pass + other entrances and exits) from 2007 (->http://www.train-media.net/report/). Half people rounded up to 1.

• Tōkyō Station
  • JR East TOTAL - 396,151
  • Tōkyō Metro Marunouchi Line - 75,433
• Ōtemachi Station
  • Tōkyō Metro Marunouchi Line - 74,777
  • Tōkyō Metro Tōzai Line - 133,459
  • Tōkyō Metro Chiyoda Line - 94,800
  • Tōkyō Metro Hanzōmon Line - 71,939
  • Toei Subway Mita Line - 39,655
• Nijūbashi-mae Station
  • Tōkyō Metro Chiyoda Line - 14,159
• Hibiya Station
  • Tōkyō Metro Hibiya Line - 54,585
  • Tōkyō Metro Chiyoda Line - 48,845
  • Toei Subway Mita Line - 35,370
• Ginza Station
  • Tōkyō Metro Ginza Line - 84,211
  • Tōkyō Metro Marunouchi Line - 72,669
  • Tōkyō Metro Hibiya Line - 90,218
• Higashi-Ginza Station
  • Tōkyō Metro Hibiya Line - 39,131
  • Toei Subway Asakusa Line - 36,216
• Yūrakuchō Station
  • JR East TOTAL - 166,545
  • Tōkyō Metro Yūrakuchō Line - 92,820

This makes a total of 886,113 entrances for the Tôkyô-Ôtemachi minimal variant, 1.298,437 for the Ôtemachi/Tôkyô/Nijûbashi-mae/Hibiya/Yûrakuchô variant and 1.620,882 for the whole thing all the way down to Higashi-ginza.

Unfortunately I had not enough time to do a similar add-up for Shinjuku for comparison right now, but the number should be around 1.8~1.9 million if I quickly skimmed the numbers correctly. I will do that later.

[quashlo]

I should mention my temporary ranking was in terms of station size / area only... I think Shinjuku wins handily if we are talking total ridership.

However, I think there are problems with simply adding everything up using that data, as each operator is treated as having its own station. There's really no good data available on how many are transferring between operators and thus are double-counted. Besides, at what point do you call something a transfer or two distinct trips? For example, if someone gets off a Yamanote Line train at Tōkyō, does some shopping or grabs something to eat inside the station, and then transfers to a Marunouchi Line train, is that a transfer or two different trips?

It also doesn't consider transferring passengers that don't switch operators at all... Since it's only station entries and exits (i.e., based on faregate data), there's no information on how many people transfer from Shinkansen to zairaisen at Tōkyō or between Tōkyō Metro lines at Ōtemachi. Plus, with retail and services inside the JR faregates, for example, it's possible that some trips never get counted at all even though passengers will have used two different trains.

[Norbb]

Ah, so I misunderstood. I thought that (except for JR which apparently does not distinguish the targeted lines of the passengers) those were entrances to a certain line through a gate, whatever the origin was. So it turns out that those are entrances to the whole system, of the one lines operator?

The total number is of course worthless for international comparisons... but it should give an idea how it compares roughly to other stations in the same environment (i.e. Tôkyô).

[quashlo]

I think in general, the numbers by line are fine for Tōkyō Metro and Toei... I still believe there is some small room for error just because of complexity of the network and possible alternative routes, but we can probably ignore it.

But like you said, as far as JR East is concerned, they only keep track of how many people enter and exit the station, which is why the "by line" ridership they give for Tōkyō Station is the same for the Tōkaidō Line as they give for the Chūō Line... There are numerous examples of this elsewhere. But perhaps because of the lack of more specific data, it's probably the only and best source at the moment.

[Norbb]

It is really a pity that JR collects only numbers in this way. So any Yamanote-sen ridership numbers are only estimates, as it is officially only the Tabata-Shinagawa segment.


There are some more things that occupy my mind:
Something I spotted about the Tôkyô subway network that I found pretty amazing. Just want to point that out, I guess most of you know this and its nothing special for you.
I had several discussions with friend and colleagues (I have subway maps on my wall in the office) and they pointed out that to them the network is completely chaotic, without any structure.

But in reality parts of it are actally very symmetric (there are some other features, but I focussed on the three western subcenters)

1. Connection of major subcenters to central Tôkyô.
2. A second line for each western subcenter, so that it has one connection north and one south of the Imperial Palace.
3. The Oedo line, which is basically a second pair of connections for Shinjuku.

[Norbb]

I rediscovered an interesting PDF-file today, named "pdf-104.pdf". Unfortunately I do not remember its source, as I downloaded around 5-6 years ago I guess - but it propably was the page of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government.



The route from Mitaka through Shinjuku to Tôkyô, and an apparent Tama Monorail extension in particular have caught my eye.

[quashlo]

Originally Posted by Norbb

I had several discussions with friend and colleagues (I have subway maps on my wall in the office) and they pointed out that to them the network is completely chaotic, without any structure.

If we consider that the subway is built under a roadway network that is itself chaotic, then I think it's easy to understand why. Compared to a network like New York where the roadways are in a grid pattern, or to networks that are large, but less dense overall (Seoul or the Chinese metros come to mind), then it's easy to see why Tōkyō's network is what it is. The network is actually somewhat similar to older systems like the Paris Metro (or even London Underground) in this regard, with high density and short station spacing. If you look at these other networks under Google Maps, they also look like messes, with lines every which way.

To be honest, I prefer this type of network... A roadway grid pattern is often designed to simplify vehicular access, but a disjointed, irregular grid like in central Tōkyō is really built for pedestrians, bicyclists, and transit, partially because it is inherently difficult to navigate by vehicle. The stations and other transit infrastructure have pretty much woven themselves into the urban fabric, which is how you can have massive complexes with 100+ exits connecting adjacent buildings, stations, etc.

[FML]

Originally Posted by Norbb

I rediscovered an interesting PDF-file today, named "pdf-104.pdf".

That's the official future plan on Jan 27 2000, approved by the committee of the MLIT, then the Ministry of Transport. So the map is very important. I'm not expert on this, but I believe it is practically impossible to build a new line without being approved on the map, with a few exceptions like Chuo Maglev. I once made a fantasy future map largely based on this.





Dark red lines were required to start operation within 2015.
Orange lines were required to start construction within 2015.
Green dotted lines were required to be considered.
Bold lines are new lines, thin lines are modifications of current lines.

You can see many of dark red lines already became reality in 2009, but not really any of orange/green lines. Yet.

[japanese001]

九州旅客鉄道(JR九州)はこのほど、九州新幹線用の新型車両「800系 U-007編成」を完成したと発表した。新型「800系」は、走行性能は従来車両と同一ながら、外観を一部変更し、内装をグレードアップさせているという。

外観の特長はヘッドライトのカバーが凸型に膨らみ、車体から盛り上がったような造形になっている。これは鉄道車両としては世界で初めて採用されたデザインとのこと。また、先頭車両にはつばめマークの象嵌(はめこみ)が施された。白い車体のアクセントとなる赤い帯は、つばめの飛行をイメージした曲線や宙返りラインとなっている。

内装は従来車と同様、「鹿児島産の樟の壁」や「宮崎産山の桜の木」、「八代産のい草を使った縄のれん」を使って和をイメージしている。さらに新型では妻壁に金箔を使用し、額縁を設けて木彫り・蒔絵・彫金や博多織を飾っている。座席は座面を深く、リクライニング角度を大きく、背ずりを低く改良された。また、シート地は車両ごとに異なり、赤系の市松柄、ワインレッドの本革、カーマイン無地、アイビー柄ゴブラン織、オレンジ系ツイード、アイビー柄西陣織を採用したという。