
The last new subway line in Japan - jpatokal
http://gyrovague.com/2015/12/18/the-last-subway-line-in-japan/
======
jackschultz
I was just in Japan and they had ads for this coming line that we weren't
quite sure what they meant. Interesting to hear that it opened, and is the
last subway line planned.

I don't have comments about the economics of Japan's railways, but I was
extremely impressed with the system itself:

\- The app to direct you through the system was really handy. Enter a starting
and ending location, and it told us how to get there perfectly. Over the
entire week we were there, we didn't have any issues taking the wrong train.

\- You pay by distance traveled by tapping a card when you enter the subway
and again when you exit. Different from the systems in the US I've travelled
(specifically Chicago) where you tap once at the beginning. Also impressed
with how quickly the system read your card.

\- The stations where you can make connections are labeled really well with
arrows noting where to go next and how far away they are. However those
connections can be really long distances. I think the longest was 700ish
meters, a little under a half a mile. Seeing 400m on a sign seemed normal.

\- Despite the distances between the connections, I don't think we had to
transfer more than once ever. The lines were very well related.

\- The stations themselves covered a giant area under the ground and had a ton
of numbered exits. Take the wrong exit and you could be a long way from where
you were trying to go. But we also used the numbers to specify where we were
coming from if we were meeting people, and guides used them in directions.

\- The trains themselves were impressively quiet. Granted Japan is in general,
but these were notably quiet. Kind of a shock to come back to Chicago and hear
the secondhand music or people yelling on the phone.

That's all I can think of off the top of my head. Really impressed with Japan
in general though. Highly recommended for people to visit.

~~~
PopsiclePete
Japan is very impressive in some ways and very...unimpressive in others. It's
like they're super-high-tech in _everything_ \- except computers, which are
very expensive compared to what you can get here in the US. That and their
strange insistence on using fax machines and cash for everything. But yes,
when it comes to taxi cabs and those _amazing_ toilets that warm your ass-
cheeks while playing music, if feels they're easily 75-100 years ahead of us.

[http://www.theonion.com/article/earthquake-sets-japan-
back-t...](http://www.theonion.com/article/earthquake-sets-japan-back-
to-2147-2240)

~~~
jackschultz
I think my biggest takeaway from Japan was that it's stuck between two worlds
-- one 20 years ahead, and one 20 years behind.

The streets were immaculately clean, but they put their bags of garbage right
on the curb where everyone could see them blocking the way.

We saw a demonstration of Asimo, the human-acting robot, which could hop on on
leg at this point. And then we would go to get food and they only accept cash.

There were "smoking only" areas on the streets (Shibuya for example), as a way
to corral and even shame smokers. And yet most places accommodated indoor
smoking.

We could go to restaurants and pre-order from a vending machine and give the
ticket to the chefs, but in those same shops, along with most coffee shops
(even the western ones), they didn't have easy access wifi.

Habits are difficult to change. Cultures must be even more difficult.

~~~
masklinn
> I think my biggest takeaway from Japan was that it's stuck between two
> worlds -- one 20 years ahead, and one 20 years behind.

I don't know that it's the right way to put it — after all mayhaps things are
just as odd the other way around — but some things were definitely jarring,
like the ubiquitous vending machines (cheap and with cold _and_ hot drinks)
next to houses with no central heating (heated room by room mostly with
kerosene heaters) or the weird ubiquity of "busybody" jobs (e.g. any form of
road encumbrance having one person on each side directing traffic, and we
crossed a lot of roadworks).

~~~
jackschultz
Very true, but I'm not sure what you mean by the other way around.

I definitely noticed the busybody jobs. Bunch of people working at the subway
stops for safety I guess? Trash collectors on the streets sweeping leaves into
their collections. People guarding semi-obstructed parking exits to make sure
no accidents occur, no matter how easy it is for the drivers to see the
sidewalk.

Then again, it's really hard to know that much about a culture in only a week.
And these are pretty giant generalizations we're talking about.

~~~
ansible
_Bunch of people working at the subway stops for safety I guess?_

They act as "pushers" during rush hour. Actually shoving people in so that the
train doors can close.

------
astrange
N.b. this article links to Spike Japan, which is a very long-form blog by some
literary British type guy who visits rural/suburban Japanese towns and tells
you all about how they're nearly abandoned due to the oncoming population
crisis.

But whenever I've linked his articles to someone who actually lives there,
they've pointed out he just visited on a holiday so all the residents have
left to go do something more interesting.

~~~
chrischen
People like to hear what they want to hear. "Ghost cities in China,"
"Sweatshops where your clothes are made." Funny thing is in the back of their
mind they actually do believe their Nike Shoes are made by Children, are
outraged, and continue to buy them.

------
rangibaby
There are a few things I would like to point out about this article:

• He goes on about linear trains being confused with maglev trains. Huh? In
the exact Wikipedia article he links to, it has a section on maglevs that use
linear motors (including JR's SCMaglev), and he describes a linear train (the
Linimo = Linear motor) as a maglev later on.

• Before JNR (the old state-owned rail company) was split into separate
companies, it was hemorrhaging money from the cost of running marginal routes.
Japan is a developed country, why does it need more infrastructure?

• I'm not sure about the Hokuriku or Hokkaido shinkansens, but calling the
Chuo Shinkansen is a public work is wrong. JR Central are financing it
entirely on their own. They seem to think it's a viable investment, so good on
them. US $72 billion overall isn't that bad. That's only ten billion more than
it cost to develop the JSF, or 72 Instagrams, and this is actually expected to
make a profit at some point (sooner if you believe it brings an economic
benefit to the cities it is connecting).

I can't really trust this article at all. Reader beware?

~~~
jpatokal
Author here.

1) I think you just proved my point. The new Sendai subway uses a linear
motor, but is not maglev, while the Linimo and Chuo are maglevs and thus use
linear induction motors more or less by definition. However, these are both
generally just dubbed リニア in the Japanese press.

2) The privatized JRs still hemorrhage money due to marginal routes, most are
loss-making and only JR Central makes sizeable profits. Until the Iwaizumi
Line was shut down last year, JR East had not shut down a single line since
privatization in 1987, despite >50 of its 60-odd lines losing money.

3) JR Central is notionally privatized, but it's still de facto an arm of the
government. The new line is being built with the central government's explicit
approval and implicit financial backing.

~~~
rangibaby
Hi!

1) I see. Why didn't you just say that more clearly in your article then? The
Japanese press runs some zingers sometimes (all the boasting about The Tokyo
Skytree, the world's tallest tower* comes to mind).

2) That's why I think not building any more lines could be a good idea. I
guess we agree on that.

3) I would like to read more about that (seriously). Could you please give
some sources? Japanese language is fine.

------
rwmj
I guess another option is to work to increase the population again. There's no
implicit reason why Japanese couldn't have more children (the immigration
option _does_ seem to be off the table).

~~~
Cyberdog
And how do you propose that would happen? They followed the same demographic
trend of birthrate decline as GDP and urbanization rose as many other
countries. There's no rolling that progress back, and I don't foresee any
particular reason they'd become an exception to that rule. It's far more
likely the politicians and/or society as a whole will come to its senses and
start promoting immigration, but I don't really see that happening either.

~~~
gutnor
There is a natural trend to have less children and have them later, but that's
not the whole story. Urbanisation means that jobs move into the city, so
that's where the worker go, but that also the most expensive places to live.
Old people generally live in the country side.

So the people that you need to make babies, first are naturally less inclined,
and even if they are, they live in a very expensive environment. The older
generation that could help them don't even live close by so that one
additional complexity.

Then there are some Japan specific stuff like the stupidity bad work-life
balance. That was bad with single worker family, but that just not feasible
when both parents are working.

There is a lot in there that is in the power of the government to help. Free
nurseries, quality schools in cheaper area of big cities (note it is useless
to give help to buy, just help people where they are instead). Cheap
activities to keep the kids occupied during the holidays. Tax breaks.
Penalising overtime. Lots of media coverage - having a kid should look
something desirable.

There is a trend, Japan won't beat the trend, but right now they are way worse
than the rest of the world and they can definitively do something to get back
in the pack.

edit: Thinking as a parent. There are a lot of practical difficulties with
children that are difficult/expensive to overcome when both parents are
working: school and nursery time - generally they open way after you need to
be at work and close way before, especially school. Here in the UK, school
close a whole 3 hours before either my wife or I stop working. What am I
supposed to do short of having relative to care of them, we will need to pay a
private school where they offer to keep them a bit longer for a ridiculous fee
on top of ridiculous admission cost.

~~~
WildUtah
"There is a trend, Japan won't beat the trend, but right now they are way
worse than the rest of the world"

Far from the worst. And the European countries in the link are artificially
propped up by immigrant births; their true citizen birth rate is even lower.

[http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.TFRT.IN/countries...](http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.TFRT.IN/countries/JP-
ES-IT-KR-DE-NG?display=graph)

------
apsec112
"A future this or any other transport technology lacks in Japan, for the Tōzai
line is almost certainly the last subway line Japan will ever build."

"Ever" is a very, very long time! There might not be any new subways for a few
decades, but the idea of a "subway" itself is only about a hundred and fifty
years old. How could one possibly know whether Japan will need new subways in
seven hundred years? And seven hundred years is just an eyeblink, compared to
"ever". The human species is about a hundred thousand years old, and most
animals have been around for far longer than that.

~~~
knappe
So a better form of transportation won't come around in over 700 years? I
think you're being a little pedantic.

~~~
apsec112
They said "almost certainly", and put "last subway line Japan will ever build"
in bold font for emphasis. In any case, that really isn't a very strong
argument:

"The next level up we start to see responses to the writing, rather than the
writer. The lowest form of these is to disagree with the author's tone. E.g. I
can't believe the author dismisses intelligent design in such a cavalier
fashion. Though better than attacking the author, this is still a weak form of
disagreement. It matters much more whether the author is wrong or right than
what his tone is. Especially since tone is so hard to judge. Someone who has a
chip on their shoulder about some topic might be offended by a tone that to
other readers seemed neutral.

So if the worst thing you can say about something is to criticize its tone,
you're not saying much. Is the author flippant, but correct? Better that than
grave and wrong. And if the author is incorrect somewhere, say where."
[http://paulgraham.com/disagree.html](http://paulgraham.com/disagree.html)

------
adventured
> Matsutani’s suggested cure is shutting down excess capacity to free up
> scarce labor, paring back investment, increasing wages and freezing taxes

In my opinion the solution is for Japan to default on their debt obligations.
They're already aggressively doing that in the classic stealth way, with
currency debasement. The problem is, that approach is going to take decades,
which ensures a non-stop erosion over that time. It would be drastically
better to do it all at once, and to then get on with rebuilding while they
have a larger working population. And while they're at it, reform the
government that got them there to begin with so it doesn't happen again.
There's no scenario where they can ever pay back their national debt, and
payments on it are consuming a very large portion of their budget. If they
take the long road, it's going to be a really bad 20 years at least, as their
current problems are going to get far worse.

~~~
frivoal
Isn't most of Japan's debt owned domestically? Making local companies and
retired people go bust by defaulting on debt they own doesn't sound like a
good way out.

~~~
wcummings
You're correct it's domestic sovereign debt.

