"The Japanese love cars, but they take trains because they have the best railway system in the world"
That's exactly it. It's not because of some cultural bias or whatever.
I'm in Japan. I use trains because it's so very easy and it's so very reliable. It's simply the best option for travelling. If I wish to go to Tokyo? I check a website quickly, I look up the best connection for my schedule (easy to find), I may pay in advance, or not. I take my bicycle and go ten minutes to the nearest station, park the bicycle in the bicycle parking there, and off I go. As it's a small station I change to a limited express train (where I've booked a seat) after ten minutes, then, after another forty minutes I reach a big station and I switch to the Shinkansen and I'm off to Tokyo. I'm relaxed all the time. I buy a coffee on the train, and/or I buy coffee and lunch at the station and bring on the train.
Every other way of getting there is way more complex, and would take way more time.
>> "The Japanese love cars, but they take trains because they have the best railway system in the world"
> That's exactly it. It's not because of some cultural bias or whatever.
Are there not a lot of toll roads in Japan as well?
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expressways_of_Japan#Tolls
Also, is not the population density fairly high? There's not as much land to spread in low-density car centric suburbs like there is in (say) the US.
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Japan#Populati...
IMHO cultural bias (and practicality, geographic and economic (low car ownership post-WW2)) is there in Japan, which led to a particular development model, which lends itself to non-car-centric infrastructure.
Contrast: Okinawa, where the US (cultural?) influence is higher and that has highways everywhere and where public transit is apparently not that good.
> Also, is not the population density fairly high? There's not as much land to spread in low-density car centric suburbs like there is in (say) the US.
LOL no. Outside of the big neighborhoods of the big cities, Japan is endless urban sprawl. I know because I live in a small Japanese city of 40k people and it's just detached houses, small 2-story apartment buildings, a big box stores. Public transportation is almost non-existant and I need to drive my car everyday for everything.
> LOL no. Outside of the big neighborhoods of the big cities, Japan is endless urban sprawl.
And how many people live in those areas?
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Japan#Urban_di...
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_weighted_density
Half the population lives in Tokyo (40M), Osaka (19M), and Nagoya (10M); one-third in the Greater Tokyo Area.
* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mg5XHN_25HQ&t=7m38s
How many folks live inside versus outside the Tokyo-Osaka-Fukuoka rail corridor (Tokaido/Sanyo Shinkansens)? Saoporo is probably the next-largest city outside of that stretch.
Tokyo is relatively dense but it's nothing like what you expect from movies or from visiting there for a few days. The majority of people live in buildings 3 storeys or less (above 3 storeys there are a lot more requirements). There's a ton of detached houses even. The overall density of the 23 wards is slightly less than Paris.
When visiting you tend to visit some of the busiest areas and also spend a lot of time on the train. It's tiring and it seems so busy. But since almost every neighbourhood has all amenities and there is no single CBD, when you live there, you realise how much of Tokyo is an endless sea of small apartment buildings with small islands of restaurants and businesses around train stations, plus a handful of larger islands.
The article talks about the railways developing areas around Tokyo. This is actually very interesting and the way it sprawled[1] outwards towards places like Yokohama. Railways made commuter towns with amenities and commuter lines to those towns at the same time, and rented and sold real estate in those towns. Over time the areas in between the terminus of each of these lines (usually Shibuya or Shinjuku) and each town filled in until what you see today.
[1] I think the debate about whether or not Tokyo is/has urban sprawl depends on your definition. If you take it to mean expanding with lower density on the outskirts, it definitely "sprawled", although today it's more filled in. If you take it to mean unplanned low-density, car-centric expansion, it didn't "sprawl" that much. I've seen the terms car-centric sprawl and train-centric sprawl used to discuss the differences.
Yeah, I know that half the population lives in either the Greater Tokyo Area or the Keihanshin area. But you still have the other half scattered all around the country.
And even within those areas, when you move to the outskirts it is not so dense. Take the train from Narita to central Tokyo and tell me what you see.
>Are there not a lot of toll roads in Japan as well?
There are, but at least wherever I've been driving or been a passenger, there are alternative roads which are just fine. In general slower, but every so often the toll roads are congested for miles due to a combination of roadwork and a LOT of traffic, which makes them slower than the alternative roads during those times.
As for cars - the Japanese aren't against cars. Many of my neighbors have two cars, particularly dual-income households. And they take very good care of them, as a rule. More than I would - to me a car is just a utility. Not for the Japanese. And people love driving too, at least outside the major cities.
Population density: Technically I live in a town with some 300,000 people. But it used to be nearly a dozen towns until 2006, when Japan decided to do some major restructuring and in many areas a bunch of smaller towns were thrown together to become a larger one. So we're really spread out..
Seoul is like this too. People look at the transit system and think it’s a model for car-less living. And while it’s fantastic, many Seoulites also love their cars. Those massive clusters of dense highrise apartment buildings you see everywhere? Most sit atop vast underground garage complexes.
> There are, but at least wherever I've been driving or been a passenger, there are alternative roads which are just fine.
And there are alternatives to the Interstate highway system in the US, but the since the Interstates have no tolls everything is build around them.
I have read you also need to prove you have a place to park a car in order to own one. (And as you point out, space is limited.)
Maybe some trains could be more redneck coded somehow? Steam trains with sweaty stokers and buffalo shooting from the windows of course had plenty of that, but how to bring something from that aesthetic to the present? Bar carriage with sports screens still sounds still a bit passive and cliche. Maybe a gym car? There are already kid and pet cars after all at least here. In German trains you get a real glass pint for your beer, I think that's a big plus.
I suspect that culturally for Americans to embrace trains, you probably need segregation; a free class and a ticketed class with a bouncer.
Riding the the train daily is the norm in the eastern United States. The urban density and shorter distances between metros allows it to be affordable.
The US is massive... riding the train between most cities is dramatically more expensive than flying and takes most of a day if not multiple days between cities.
I used to commute weekly between two cities in Texas and it was a 2 hour flight. (Houston - Lubbock)
i mean the Shinkansen has two classes as well :)
three, now!
> “An advanced city is not one where even the poor use cars, but rather one where even the rich use public transport.”
On the JR line in Tokyo, standing with a friend who motions to me with his glance to a salaryman standing next to us. "Hand-stitched suit", my friend whispers. Which is when I notices this guy's "threads" (literally).
Perhaps not Warren Buffett, but no doubt an executive of some stature riding with the rest of us plebes.
Ah! But is your bicycle registered and do you have insurance.
(I agree with the trains. I love the trains.)
Registered, very likely—it's required and IIRC done at time of purchase.
People insure bikes?
At my native home my bicycles are insured, now through my home insurance (part of the furniture, kind of), but at one point one of my electric bicycles was too expensive for that and required additional insurance. As soon as the price dropped a bit I could drop that extra insurance.
As the comment above said, in Japan a bicycle is registered to a person when you buy it. Even the second hand bikes from recycle shops. And there _is_ a theft problem.. but not everywhere. I sometimes don't bother with locking my bicycle outside the shopping mall, here (in my town in Japan). Nobody steals bicycles here. There was a time when a particular gang of teenagers would steal scooters though.. the 50cc ones. A friend's scooter was stolen. The police found the culprits and he got his scooter back. But not much problems with bicycles. Unlike in my town back home. Now that I'm here I would not be surprised if, when I go back, I find that someone broke into my garage and stole the bicycles.
They are easy to steal and can cost multiple thousands of dollars.
Though even if you're getting an hybrid assist bike, if you're paying much more than 1500$ for a commuter, probably overpaying [1200 from the manufacturer]
https://www.aventon.com/products/soltera-2-5-ebike?variant=4...
Convenience & simplicity aside, how expensive is it? Not necessarily compared to driving, but just in general. When I went to Japan a long time ago, I remember being kinda shocked at the cost compared to the JR Pass for tourists (which included the Shinkansen), but part of that was to give tourists a huge incentive to spend some money outside of Tokyo, I'm sure, but I remember some fares feeling expensive for people just to head into the city for a night out...
I don't think it's expensive, but then again I'm comparing it to train prices in Northern Europe, which is just painful. There, I'm used to pay for the ticket through gritted teeth. In Japan I can pay for a ticket + limited express (better train w/booked better seat) for a 45 minute ride for what I would pay for a pint of beer at home. Totally worth it. The Shinkansen for a 90 minute ride is not cheap, say ten beers.. Northern Europe beer prices, mind.