Rail transport in Japan


Rail transport in Japan is a major means of passenger transport, especially for mass and high-speed travel between major cities and for commuter transport in urban areas. It is used relatively little for freight transport, accounting for just 0.84% of goods movement. The privatized network is highly efficient, requiring few subsidies and running with extreme punctuality, though since privatization, several unprofitable but socially valuable lines have been closed by operators.

Overview

services in Japan are provided by more than 100 companies, including:
Many of the private rail companies rank among the top corporations in the country. Railways were built by private corporations developing integrated communities along the railway lines, allowing them to achieve profitability by diversifying into real estate, retail, and numerous other businesses. These rail integrated communities are a form of transit oriented development unique to the rail system in Japan. Rail integrated communities increase walkability in these urban spaces. As they are to be used by pedestrians, they include sidewalks and bikeways. Regional governments, and companies funded jointly by regional governments and private companies, also provide rail service.
There are of rail crisscrossing the country. JR controlled 20,135 km of these lines as of March 31, 1996, with the remaining in the hands of private enterprise local railway companies. Japan's railways carried 9.147 billion passengers in the year 2013–14. In comparison, Germany has over of railways, but carries only 2.2 billion passengers per year. Because of the massive use of its railway system, Japan is home to 46 of the world's 50 busiest stations.
The major usage is of urban and intercity lines, and around the time of the privatisation of JNR, many unprofitable local and rural lines were closed, especially in Hokkaido and Kyushu. However, with patronage on many non-urban local lines continuing to decline due to factors such as rising levels of car ownership and declining rural populations, further closures are planned. For example, On October 16, 2015, JR West announced that it was considering closing the Sanko Line due to poor patronage, and was in discussion with the two prefectures served by the line, Shimane and Hiroshima, as well as other municipalities served, concerning future plans. In fiscal 2014, the line carried an average of 50 passengers per km per day, compared to 458 per km per day in 1987. The entire line closed on March 31, 2018.
On November 19, 2016, JR Hokkaido's President announced plans to further rationalise its network by up to, or ~50% of the current network, including closure of the remaining section of the Rumoi Main Line, the Shin-Yubari - Yubari section of the Sekisho Line, the non-electrified section of the Sassho Line and the Nemuro Line between Furano and Kami-Ochiai Junction. Other lines including the Sekihoku Main Line, Senmo Main Line, the Nayoro - Wakkanai section of the Soya Line and Kushiro - Nemuro section of the Nemuro Line are proposed for conversion to Third Sector operation, but if local governments are not agreeable, such sections will also face closure.
Fukuoka, Kobe, Kyoto, Nagoya, Osaka, Sapporo, Sendai, Tokyo and Yokohama have subway systems. However, unlike Europe, the vast majority of passenger traffic is on suburban commuter trains that criss-cross metropolitan areas. In addition, many cities have streetcar and monorail networks.
Japan pioneered the high-speed shinkansen or "bullet train", which now links Japan's largest cities at speeds of up to. However, other trains running on the conventional line or "zairaisen" remain relatively slow, operating at fastest and mostly under, most likely due to the wide usage of narrow-gauge tracks they operate on.
Japan's railways carried 31 million tons of goods in 2013–14. The share of railways in the national logistics is as small as 6.2%, by far the lowest in the G8.

History

Railways are the most important means of passenger transportation in Japan, maintaining this status since the late nineteenth century. Government policy promoted railways as an efficient transportation system for a country that lacks fossil fuels and is nearly completely dependent on imports.
Rural land near large cities was acquired cheaply by private railway companies from the late nineteenth century, which then built lines that became the backbone of urban transport between the suburbs and cities formed around the railway lines radiating out from metropolitan areas, similar to suburban growth around railways in other nations.
Despite this efficiency, growing affluence and associated car ownership led to road transportation usage increasing to the detriment of rail from the 1960s. The relative share of railways in total passenger kilometers fell from 66.7 percent in 1965 to 42 percent in 1978, and 29.8 percent in 1990, although this still accounted for the largest percentage of the OECD member countries.
The figure is 43.5% in the largest metropolitan areas in Japan: Tokyo, Osaka, and Nagoya. Private automobiles in Greater Tokyo account for less than 20% of daily trips as car ownership is restricted to those with a dedicated parking space.

Timeline

Types of operators

JR

The Japan Railways Group, more commonly known as JR Group, is a group of successors of the government-owned Japanese National Railways. The JR Group lies at the heart of Japan's railway network, operating almost all intercity rail services and a large proportion of commuter rail services.
The six passenger operating companies of the JR Group are separated by region, but many operate long-distance train services beyond their regional boundaries. The six companies are: Hokkaido Railway Company, East Japan Railway Company, Central Japan Railway Company, West Japan Railway Company, Shikoku Railway Company, and Kyushu Railway Company.
Freight service belongs to Japan Freight Railway Company or JR Freight which operates all freight network previously owned by JNR.

Major private railways

Japan also features multiple competing private railway systems. In post-war Japan, the Japanese government encouraged private corporations to develop their own mass transit systems in order to quickly rebuild the country's urban transport networks.
Private rail lines were encouraged to compete with each other as well as the national rail lines with the government's role limited to regulation of fares. In exchange for developing rail lines, private corporations were given business opportunities to diversify their operations and develop the real estate surrounding their railway networks.
By allowing private corporations to control transit oriented developments as well as railway lines, planned communities were facilitated allowing private railway operators to establish a vertically integrated business of developing residential, business, industrial and retail land and the commuting methods used by the populace to travel between such areas.
As such, through diversification of their business, the majority of the private railways in Japan are financially independent and their railway operations are usually profitable, in sharp contrast to most transit networks in other countries.
The classifies the following 16 companies as the major private railways of Japan. These companies, in total, operate 2,870.1 kilometers of rail. In a one-year period from April 2009, a total of 9.46 billion passengers traveled by means of these major railways.