# Using Japan Rail (JR) questions



## v v (Dec 27, 2022)

I've read a bit about using Japan Rail, not everything but an introduction. Buying tickets is the obvious start point and see there are English language ticket machines in many stations but... apparently they don't cover all aspects of Shinkansen trains, just some.
Is my information out of date or does this still hold true?

The other options are to go to a station in advance of the journey (apparently 3 days before) and buy at the ticket counter, or use a ticket agency and collect from them or have them send tickets to your hotel, not my best option more a last resort. Sometimes post doesn't arrive in time (maybe it always does in Japan?).

Our journeys are from the Tokyo Haneda airport to downtown Tokyo, will buy those on the spot. Then 2 or 3 Shinkansen journeys from Tokyo to Japan's south west and maybe part way back again, itinerary not decided yet.

I've decided against a Japan rail Pass as it looks a bit messy with it's conditions, we'll have to keep it simple for Japan as we don't have any Japanese language at all.

Any updated or first hand advice on this please?

Thank you


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## George Harris (Dec 27, 2022)

What looks messy about the Japan Rail Pass to you? Best I recall, it covers everything except sleepers and one class of Shinkansen service. You can save a significant amount of money with the rail pass. We did a six day visit to Japan in 2006, so my memory of some of the details are a little foggy, but we had no trouble at all. If you can read maps, get a Lonely Planet guide book for Japan and a Japanese Railway system timetable. Look up you planned origin/destination in the Lonely Planet, match the areas in the JR timetable, and match your plan location in the Lonely Planet with the position of the spot on the map in the JR timetable. Numbers are numbers, 24 hour clock of course. Choose train, go to machine or ticket counter, get ticket. Generally people are very helpful if you start off with an apology for being unable to read or speak their language. Any sign of arrogance will get you nowhere. Quite a lot of people know English in varying amounts for a few words to fluent. There is quite a bit of bilingual signage, and many of the recorded announcements are also bilingual, Japanese and English. (My general finding has been that, at least for most Asian countries, the most common second language either written or spoken is English. If you can't manage to somehow get along in one or the other of these, then you can truly find yourself lost.) I did have a certain advantage in that I can read a little Chinese. Not enough to consider myself at all literate, but enough to recognize quite a few place names and to be able to match up a character stroke by stroke. A lot of the Japanese place names are written in what is essentially Chinese characters. Knowing the sound in Chinese is of zero help in trying to say the name in Japanese as even though the same in meaning they are not the same in sound. 

We did all our travels there on public transportation, train, subway, city bus. All works well. Again, the details of how and what came primarily from information in the Lonely Planet. Go with a right attitude, be flexible, and it should be a fascinating experience.


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## jis (Dec 27, 2022)

If you plan to do extensive travel on Shinkansen and insist on doing so without a JR Pass, I am afraid you will land up paying a lot lot more than with a JR Pass. Not being able to travel on Nozhomis and Mizuhos is not really that big a deal since they are a bit faster than the next fasted Shinkansen and there are jillions of alternative Shinkansen trains throughout the day.

Whenever I have traveled extensively in Japan I have *always* used a JR Pass. Admittedly there are some odd exceptions beyond Sleepers and those Shinkansen. Those are on the Aoimori Railway between Aomori and Hachinche, JR Ishikawa Railway Line between Kanazawa and Tsubata and Ainokaza Toyoma Railway Line between Toyoma and Takaoka. But those aren't frequently used lines by typical JR Pass users. If you plan to use those you just buy a local ticket.

Oh, and also remember to get your Passport stamped (actually these days stickered) with the "Temporary Visitor" stamp/sticker, which requires using a manned entry station rather than an automatic gate at the Immigration checkpoint at the point of entry into Japan.


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## v v (Dec 27, 2022)

Two superb and very helpful replies, thank you George and jis.

Just a couple points. George we travel using some of your methods, they come naturally to us too. I ask for information here as I prefer it 'from the horses mouth', this forum has never let me down.
We do have both the LP and Rough Guide Japan books, but my first stop is here.

Later this evening (I'm working at the moment, so much for retirement), I'll re-read both replies to take the maximum from them.

jis. I'm not sure if I miss-read the cost of a 1 week JR Travel Pass vs the cost of a single journey from Tokyo to Hiroshima, the single fare was about 1/2 the cost of a Pass. Add to that there are exceptions to it's use and I mistakenly? dismissed it.
Also not sure what you call extensive Shinkansen travel. We may make the journey above and one or two shorter journeys. Most of our time will be spent in central Tokyo and visiting Hiroshima or Nagasaki. As we don't have any Japanese language we may struggle to mix with locals, so wish to see on our first short visit what is important to us.

On a lighter note, our hotel in Tokyo is named 'Under The Railway Hotel', that's right, it's under the railway.


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## jis (Dec 27, 2022)

I would not use a JR Pass for a single journey of course. Typically when I am there for a week I tend to take very many Shinkansen rides. I was perhaps, foolishly, assuming that you were planning extensive travel in Japan. If you are not then I agree, a JR Pass may be an overkill, as is true of any pass anywhere.

But truth be told, there were trips when I was not sure what traveling I will be doing in Japan and yet I got a JR Pass simply for the convenience of never having to worry about buying a ticket for anything during my trip, and at the end of it I might or might not have come out monetarily ahead of buying individual tickets.

Incidentally, I know hardly any Japanese beyond Hello, Goodbye and Where is and such. I had no problem traveling even deep into the hinterland. You have to become good at pattern matching to read the signs and match them with pattern in your guidebook or such. Back when I traveled Romanji signs were less prevalent in the hinterland than they are now, so pattern matching is all I had.


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## v v (Dec 27, 2022)

jis said:


> But truth be told, there were trips when I was not sure what traveling I will be doing in Japan and yet I got a JR Pass simply for conveience of never having to worry about buying a ticket for anything during my trip, nd at the end of it I might or might have come out monetarily ahead of buying individual tickets.



Yes, I see that now, thank you.


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## George Harris (Dec 27, 2022)

As JIS said, unless your train riding is already settled and very limited, you would probably be better off with the pass. The Shinkansen exclusions are just for the few top trains, not for all the trains on that particular route, so to us that was a not issue. We did one night is a sleeper between Sapporo and a point on the east coast of Hokkaido just to ride the day train back through the mountains in the snow. I think that is the only ride we paid for outside the pass. Our first day in we paid directly for the trip from the airport into the city just to keep the clock on the pass from starting that day. One day my wife just wanted to veg for a while in the hotel so I just went out and rode trains. If you end up taking the ferry across to Korea, by the time you take the train to the Japanese side port, I suspect that buying the pass would keep you ahead in the game.


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## xzperu42 (Dec 28, 2022)

If you only plan on taking the Shinkansen one way between Tokyo and Hiroshima and a couple of short journeys then I agree you are better off buying the tickets in Japan And NOT purchasing a JR Pass. it will cost less and while the JR pass restriction on not being able to take Nozomi trains may not be critical on a Tokyo to Kyoto Journey… it becomes more of a hassle and time loss when traveling all the way to Hiroshima as a change of train will also be required when you are limited to Hikari trains.

I also personally do not buy a JR Pass when traveling to Japan with my wife. since I am a rail fan and my wife is not… it keeps my desire to ride trains in check. Also worth noting in the past it was also possible to buy a ticket in Japan with stopovers. This can be cheaper than point to point tickets and force the rail fan to keep train riding impulses in check. Note i do also go on trips to Japan by myself, buy a JR pass, and ride trains into the ground.


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## CaptPete 43 (Dec 28, 2022)

Get a Green Car JR Rail pass. The extra cost is insignificant and gets larger seats that accommodate western size people. These cars are also less crowed usually.
Sit back in the Green Car, have a sake, and a snack. My go to snack is little packets of cuttle fish. 

I have been to Japan > 50 times for a week at a time, so my recommendations are well based.


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## xzperu42 (Dec 28, 2022)

If you want to enjoy a Green Car, I agree it is much nicer… especially on a Shinkansen where seating is 2-2 rather than 2-3. But if you are traveling only one way from Tokyo to Hiroshima it still makes no sense to buy a JR pass. Especially when you consider it will require a change of train and take about an hour longer using a JR pass than purchasing a one-way, one train, Nozomi Shinkansen ticket.


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## CaptPete 43 (Dec 28, 2022)

You are correct, but almost any round trip from Tokyo to Kyoto or further pays off. To go one way Green Car Tokyo to Hiroshima is JPY 26,700.


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## xzperu42 (Dec 28, 2022)

Note that the JR prices listed in the chart above are for *ordinary (2nd class) passes* purchased in advance. You get an exchange voucher which must be exchanged for the JR Pass once in Japan.


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## CaptPete 43 (Dec 28, 2022)

Correct and the price for a Green Car JR Pass is about 25% higher.


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## Devil's Advocate (Dec 28, 2022)

George Harris said:


> What looks messy about the Japan Rail Pass to you?


The choosing, exchanging, validating, and activating parts can be a little messy for new users. If you make a mistake or lose or damage anything the rail pass is not designed to be fixable. After the first use it's easy to understand but before that it can be kind of tedious for first time buyers on a short trip. I wish the rail pass was more automated like Suica/Passmo rather than an antiquated manual inspection card.



CaptPete 43 said:


> Get a Green Car JR Rail pass. The extra cost is insignificant and gets larger seats that accommodate western size people. These cars are also less crowed usually.


I never bothered with the Green Car in the past but I'm more inclined after realizing regular pass inventory can be exhausted leaving you delayed or stranded. There's also a risk of boarding with a sea of Western teens crawling over seats and making an exhausting racket.


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## CaptPete 43 (Dec 28, 2022)

A Green Car Pass is great. Trust me I have travelled > 50,000 rail miles in Japan with them. And remember sake plus cuttle fish


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## v v (Dec 28, 2022)

Does the Shinkansen routing for Tokyo ~> Hiroshima only travel via Yokohama and Nagoya,? It appears that way on google maps.


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## xzperu42 (Dec 28, 2022)

v v said:


> Does the Shinkansen routing for Tokyo ~> Hiroshima only travel via Yokohama and Nagoya,? It appears that way on google maps.


That is correct.


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## diesteldorf (Dec 28, 2022)

Just got back from Japan and wanted to add.....

If you do decide to purchase a Japan Rail Pass, I would recommend purchasing direct from JAPAN RAIL PASS | ジャパン・レール・パス

It'll be slightly more than buying from a reseller in your local country, but buying online will allow you to book your trips prior to arriving in Japan, and I also found the online website to be more convenient than using the ticket machines.

Also, if you are traveling with large luggage, you may need to book a separate reservation in the oversized baggage car for your luggage.
It won't cost anymore, but it is a new policy to prevent everyone from rushing to the back or front of the car to claim the oversized baggage space.

Good Luck.


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## v v (Dec 28, 2022)

CaptPete 43 said:


> And remember sake plus cuttle fish



Just a tad off topic but never having eaten Cuttle fish what do they taste like without the Sake?

Also off topic but very relevant to the travel project:

What sort of weather can we expect in Mid February in Tokyo and the Hiroshima area? Our intention was to travel very light but have since research average temps in Japan, brrr. It's the opposite to our first and last countries.


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## Devil's Advocate (Dec 28, 2022)

diesteldorf said:


> It'll be slightly more than buying from a reseller in your local country, but buying online will allow you to book your trips prior to arriving in Japan, and I also found the online website to be more convenient than using the ticket machines.


For me the main benefit of the rail pass is that I can travel when and where it's convenient without a lot of advance booking.



v v said:


> What sort of weather can we expect in Mid February in Tokyo and the Hiroshima area? Our intention was to travel very light but have since research average temps in Japan, brrr. It's the opposite to our first and last countries.


Winter in Tokyo can be bitterly cold while the trains will often be very warm so bring several layers of clothing. I've found Patagonia style outerwear and knit caps to be both thin and warm so you might look into something like that.


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## west point (Dec 28, 2022)

As I understand south and west of Tokkyp is 50 Hz and north and west is 60 Hz. What are the CAT voltages? Realize that there is some DC CAT ?? Does HSR and HrSR rail trains that runs on AC able to run on both 50 & 60 Hz ? They would need the heavier transformers that can handle 50 Hz. What about commercial power to homes and business ?


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## George Harris (Dec 29, 2022)

I think the 50/60 Hz is for everything, and the trains are using both because they are following the house Hz, not the other way around. Not certain, because we had no electronics with us. The Shinkansen trainsets in Taiwan are 60 Hz because the country is. Remember, the through trains on the NEC are 25Hz south of New York and 60 Hz north thereof.

Yes, Japanese winters are COLD. When we went it was during the Chinese New Year, which is usually in January or February, and our only trip where the train did not do what it scheduled to do was on our last full day. We were going to ride to the Sea of Japan side of Honshu mainly just to do it, to see more mountains and snow. The train, Nagoya to Kanazawa, I think it was but not sure, got about half way there, stopped, then a little further and stopped, and finally about 2/3 the way there stopped and an announcement was made - in Japanese only - that said we were going no further because the wires were down further up the line due to heavy snow and ice. I asked in an apologetic way, what did they say, and that was the answer I got from someone in the car that could speak a certain amount of English. Ran into the station, grabbed a couple of lunch boxes, got back on the train and shortly after that the train started moving and we went back to Nagoya, getting there just before midnight and after the last train of the day to Tokyo had gone. I thought we were likely to spend the night on station benches, but there was a plaque on the wall with local hotel information. Found a pay phone and started calling, and with about the fourth one found one that both had someone that could speed English and a room available, so we were able to sleep in a bed and catch an early morning Shinkansen to get ourselves back to Tokyo and Narita in time to catch our flight. This gets around to what can happen when things do not go as planned. Most standard recorded announcements are bilingual, but those that are one off frequently are not. When we were waiting for the train in Nagoya, there was a length announcement in Japanese only, and about half the people waiting walked away from the gate. They were probably announcing what we later found out. I am standing there thinking, it might really be good if I understood that, but since a lot of people stayed, I did not even ask for help. Later learned a couple of trainloads of people spent the night before in cold trains in the affected area. This also gets around to people making helpful suggestions that may not really be helpful. One man on the train suggested that since the place where we were when the train made its final pause had an airport we might want to see if we could get a flight to Tokyo. I said in essence, thank you very much but I think we are going to stay here and see what happens with the train. Actually, my thinking was, if the train can't make it, chances are even less that there will be a flight operating, even if we could get on it.


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## George Harris (Dec 29, 2022)

diesteldorf said:


> Just got back from Japan and wanted to add.....
> 
> If you do decide to purchase a Japan Rail Pass, I would recommend purchasing direct from JAPAN RAIL PASS | ジャパン・レール・パス


We got ours through what passes for the Japanese embassy in Taipei, which I think was effectively the same thing as getting it directly from their web site.

Warning, in case you did not already know: The pass must be purchased before you get to Japan, and I think is not available to citizens or legal residents.


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## v v (Dec 29, 2022)

We have now decided to use the Shinkansen from Tokyo to Hiroshima, then a couple of days later another to the end of the line at Kagoshima... to catch the islands ferry.

Change in this part of the plan is due to possible weather conditions that we didn't pick up on until a day or two ago. We are also travelling in the tropics in the same journey and intend to travel light so wont have our regular winter clothes with.

Will also write on the Japan ferry thread a little later.

Thank you George


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## v v (Dec 29, 2022)

As an additional note on the post above. In a day or two I'll look at the individual costs of the journeys vs a rail pass. The intent is to take the green car for the first leg and the normal type of car for the second. 

I am registered to buy directly now so as we are only buying 2 tickets the individual ones may be the better bet?


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## George Harris (Dec 29, 2022)

Don't know if you have been to East Asia before, but if you definition on "international" is in reference to the various differences between European countries, which seemed to be the case with several of the Europeans I worked with you will be in for some shocks. Firstly, due to the combination of simple population density and the mentality of the people, their definition of personal space is approximately zero. That really not strike us in Japan, but by that time we went we had spent most of the previous 16 years in Taiwan, so our definition of normal people density had adjusted. Therefore, having heard about the super crowdedness of the Tokyo subway, when we actually saw and rode it, we were looking at each other saying, what's the big deal? Nothing that out of the ordinary here. Personal contact between two men in an office setting when discussing a matter is considered normal, at least in Taiwan. Don't know about Japan for that. Conversely, when the first TGV sets went into operation in Korea, they had the standard European facing pairs of seats. That did not go over well with the female population. In essence the response was, "I am not sitting knee to knee with some man I do not know."


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## v v (Dec 30, 2022)

We both grew up on the edge of central London and for a few years both worked in central London. Travelling the tube at rush hour at certain times of day gave you nil personal space, in fact sometimes you had to bend and twist your body to fit with those around you.

Couple of weeks ago in Cairo where a lot of life is lived on the streets there are areas which are permantly crowded 18 hours a day, large areas the size of small towns.

We did visit Taiwan with about 3 days in central Taipei about 4 years ago and although busy didn't find it too crowded, but we may have got lucky?

In Taiwan we travelled from Koahsiung City to Taipei on the high speed train, for me that was the most interesting high speed train I've travelled on so far for various reasons.

We know very little about life or culture in SE Asia, anything you can add is very much appreciated.


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## George Harris (Dec 30, 2022)

v v said:


> We did visit Taiwan with about 3 days in central Taipei about 4 years ago and although busy didn't find it too crowded, but we may have got lucky?
> 
> In Taiwan we travelled from Kaohsiung City to Taipei on the high speed train, for me that was the most interesting high speed train I've travelled on so far for various reasons.
> 
> We know very little about life or culture in SE Asia, anything you can add is very much appreciated.


I spent 5 years 1990-5 working on the Taipei Metro and 9 years, 1998 to 2007 on the Taiwan HSR.

Taiwan did an astounding amount of improvement and cleanup during that period. During the first years we were there Taipei city installed a sanitary sewer system and treatment plant resulting in a tremendous clean up of the waterways through the city. During the same period two cycle engine motor scooters disappeared resulting in considerable atmospheric clearing. By now the MRT has expanded far beyond their original plan as it was when I was there. The city is significantly less congested since its construction than it was before. I could go on for a while, but I won't but will say that the passenger related features were designed and built to meet US ADA requirements.

I was on the HSR project from it being a line on the map to riding the first trains. The basic alignment was developed by the government and put out for a "DBOM" contract. (That is Design, Build, Operate, Maintain.) I was with the DBOM. A long convoluted story here. The original DBOM included a German and French contingent who later went away to be replaced by the Japanese for track, equipment, power, and signals, although there are some things peculiarly German in some of the track details, plus some "none of the aboves" in some of the alignment details. Lengthy story behind the change, reasons mostly financial, rather than political as the Euro side would like the world to believe. Thus, the original details of the alignment and stations were based on TGV equipment, although the mainline curve standards are based on the Shinkansen standards, as they were the advisors to the government during the initial planning. The southern portion has 157.3 km of continuous viaduct. The original plan was for the one stop train to be 1 hour 30 minutes end to end, but they forgot about the curves in the last couple miles on each end so it is 1 hour 34 minutes with one intermediate stop. There has to be a certain amount of humor when the all stops train is called a local and covers the 340 km in 2 hours 14 minutes, having 9 intermediate stops. That is an average of 154.6 km/hr for the "slow" train. System speed limit is 300 km/hr. Again we managed a very tight platform gap. Vertically it is a few mm over US ADA, but horizontally it is within US ADA limits. (For those unfamiliar, ADA is the Americans with Disabilities Act which has numerous requirements to enable access by persons with various disabilities.)


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## Bob Dylan (Dec 30, 2022)

v v said:


> We both grew up on the edge of central London and for a few years both worked in central London. Travelling the tube at rush hour at certain times of day gave you nil personal space, in fact sometimes you had to bend and twist your body to fit with those around you.
> 
> Couple of weeks ago in Cairo where a lot of life is lived on the streets there are areas which are permantly crowded 18 hours a day, large areas the size of small towns.
> 
> ...


The most crowded Public Transportation I've experienced is the Subway in Mexico City during Rush Hour!( Tokyo Trains are very Crowded during Rush Hours but the people are much more polite! Don't think yall will have many problems with this in Japan)

It got so bad they had to designate Cars for Females so they wouldn't be harrased by the Macho Guys that create the crush on the Cars.

Unfortunately they couldn't do much about the Pick Pockets and Thieves that work the Stations and Trains.


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## v v (Dec 30, 2022)

George Harris said:


> I spent 5 years 1990-5 working on the Taipei Metro and 9 years, 1998 to 2007 on the Taiwan HSR.
> 
> Taiwan did an astounding amount of improvement and cleanup during that period. During the first years we were there Taipei city installed a sanitary sewer system and treatment plant resulting in a tremendous clean up of the waterways through the city. During the same period two cycle engine motor scooters disappeared resulting in considerable atmospheric clearing. By now the MRT has expanded far beyond their original plan as it was when I was there. The city is significantly less congested since its construction than it was before. I could go on for a while, but I won't but will say that the passenger related features were designed and built to meet US ADA requirements.
> 
> I was on the HSR project from it being a line on the map to riding the first trains. The basic alignment was developed by the government and put out for a "DBOM" contract. (That is Design, Build, Operate, Maintain.) I was with the DBOM. A long convoluted story here. The original DBOM included a German and French contingent who later went away to be replaced by the Japanese for track, equipment, power, and signals, although there are some things peculiarly German in some of the track details, plus some "none of the aboves" in some of the alignment details. Lengthy story behind the change, reasons mostly financial, rather than political as the Euro side would like the world to believe. Thus, the original details of the alignment and stations were based on TGV equipment, although the mainline curve standards are based on the Shinkansen standards, as they were the advisors to the government during the initial planning. The southern portion has 157.3 km of continuous viaduct. The original plan was for the one stop train to be 1 hour 30 minutes end to end, but they forgot about the curves in the last couple miles on each end so it is 1 hour 34 minutes with one intermediate stop. There has to be a certain amount of humor when the all stops train is called a local and covers the 340 km in 2 hours 14 minutes, having 9 intermediate stops. That is an average of 154.6 km/hr for the "slow" train. System speed limit is 300 km/hr. Again we managed a very tight platform gap. Vertically it is a few mm over US ADA, but horizontally it is within US ADA limits. (For those unfamiliar, ADA is the Americans with Disabilities Act which has numerous requirements to enable access by persons with various disabilities.)



Thank you George, a report doesn't come any better than this, straight from the horse's mouth. What an interesting life you have had, what's next?

In part it was the initial elevated viaduct that fascinated me, why was that 157.3 km all viaduct and from memory not so high above ground level either. And why not a mix of viaduct and running on ground level?
I am not a rail engineering enthusiast as such rather love trains as a preferred mode of travel for multiple reasons, but I do have a hearing abilty of picking up mechanical noise in vehicles even if human speech isn't always so clear to me.
On that journey I heard an axle bearing (if that exists) that was worn which became 'interesting' as the speed rose. It was about 2 m ahead of where we sat and on the opposite side of the car.

I did ponder how the workshops would test for such an event as all bearing surfaces wear at some point. Are there sound or vibration sensors? If it had been on an auto or truck it would be due for a change before other components were affected.

Thoroughly enjoyed your report, thanks for taking the trouble to write it.


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## v v (Dec 30, 2022)

Bob Dylan said:


> The most crowded Public Transportation I've experienced is the Subway in Mexico City during Rush Hour!( Tokyo Trains are very Crowded during Rush Hours but the people are much more polite! Don't think yall will have many problems with this in Japan)
> 
> It got so bad they had to designate Cars for Females so they wouldn't be harrased by the Macho Guys that create the crush on the Cars.
> 
> Unfortunately they couldn't do much about the Pick Pockets and Thieves that work the Stations and Trains.



Hope we get to meet up this year Jim, would love to hear more about your time riding the rails in those big cities. If you've got a tent then round to ours in July for a close-up look at the Tour de France.


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## George Harris (Dec 30, 2022)

Bob Dylan said:


> Unfortunately they couldn't do much about the Pick Pockets and Thieves that work the Stations and Trains.


OK, sorry for a completely off topic answer: Have had the pocket picking experience twice. Once on a bus in Kowloon (Hong Kong) the other a city bus in San Francisco. The first one hit a jackpot because I cash for a round trip plane ticket to Taipei in my pocket. The second one tried to buy a suit with it at a store further away than he could have walked from where he grabbed it. Fortunately the charge was rejected because it was a company travel card.


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## UserNameRequired (Dec 31, 2022)

v v said:


> …
> I am not a rail engineering enthusiast as such rather love trains as a preferred mode of travel for multiple reasons, but I do have a hearing abilty of picking up mechanical noise in vehicles even if human speech isn't always so clear to me.
> On that journey I heard an axle bearing (if that exists) that was worn which became 'interesting' as the speed rose. It was about 2 m ahead of where we sat and on the opposite side of the car.
> 
> ...


I know nothing of Japanese rail, but American rail tend to use hot box detection to find hot bearings getting ready to fail. Temperature based not audible as far as I know.








Hot box - Wikipedia







en.wikipedia.org




While on the LSL this summer, I did hear a flat spot or spalling spot somewhere in the front bogey wheel to rail surface of a coach car while walking through the vestibule. I was curious to see what it looked like at a smoke break but never remembered to go look. It must not have been bad enough for Amtrak to pull the car out?

I further wonder if Japanese rail does use defect detectors if they can be listened to over the radio, hmm…


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## Metra Electric Rider (Dec 31, 2022)

What I've been told about Chinese and Japanese personal space by people who've lived there is that the Japanese are a) more reserved (I think some Koreans may be too) and b) will give more personal space when available. One example was a Chinese man on a train talking close to an American who couldn't understand a word, but apparently they enjoyed the conversation. In Japan, my friend said, the man would never have leaned in to talk. Maybe those of you who've lived/been there can confirm. 

I just remembered a story by my Nisei neighbor about being in Japan with her husband and friends (all Nisei though I think her husband was the only one who actually spoke Japanese). They got into a taxi and the driver said something about being glad that they were not American's or something along those lines (as in Japanese-American believe it or not) and got a dressing down by her husband.


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## George Harris (Jan 2, 2023)

To answer your questions, with a couple of semi unrelated comments:
Note to editors: If you think this is too much or too far off topic, feel free to modify or move. I will not be offended. I really don't plan on writing more on the Taiwan HSR beyond this. The first paragraph is more or less background and a little semi-relevant information.

While in Taiwan , my wife was teaching at the Taipei American School (TAS), teaching advanced math to middle schoolers. To diverge even further from our subject matter, here is a good example of some of the surprises you get into when moving to another country. First, TAS had two pay scales for teachers, “local hire” and “overseas hire” with the local hire pay scale being much lower than the overseas hire pay scale. She went in as a local hire because she did not apply for a teaching job until we were there. Second, in Taiwan, middle school and elementary school teachers, including those in private schools, were exempt from Taiwan’s income tax, high school teachers were not. That one we did not know until we did our local income tax form at the end of our first year there. That saved us considerable money as the rate scales are based on family income.

How is her teaching at TAS relevant? Well, one her teacher buddies took a vacation to Japan with her parents. During that trip they took a couple of trips on the Shinkansen trains. Her father was an engineer of the train driving variety for Union Pacific. On one of these trips he walked up to the front of the train and spoke with the train driver (who obviously understood and spoke some English.) After a brief conversation and showing the Shinkansen train driver his card as a Union Pacific engineer he was invited up to the cab and rode a couple stops. Afterward, when he walked back to his family all he first said was, “I can die now.” Feel I can talk about this now because it happened about 30 years in the past, so that anyone that could be found guilty of rules infractions has probably retired. You will also notice that I did not say where to where.

Said that in part to introduce this: During the test runs phase prior to opening I took some rides on the Taiwan HSR trains, some of it in the cab and some of it observing the instrumentation measuring speed, forces, power draw, etc. There was no sense that we were at all pushing or even close to the limit of practical operating speed when running at the 300 km/hr (that 186 mph in American) maximum speed. In fact there was no real sense of running a very high speed other than passing the catenary poles like they were at fencepost spacing. It should be noted that the main track alignment design is based on being able in the future to increase the speed to 350 km/hr should it be deemed to be desirable. It is comparatively cheap to modify power systems, equipment, etc. to permit higher speed but alignment you are fairly well stuck with forever. Remember, the Roman roads are today exactly where they were when built 2,000 years ago.

There were some steps into the unknown because even though the trains, power, train control systems, and most of the track features were essentially completely Japanese, there were track and some alignment features that were not fully either Japanese or German, with there being some combinations and some none of the above. The rail is the Japanese 60 kg/m section, which is very close to 119RE in shape. It is not the European EN60, also called UIC60, as some publications have said. Most of the track is the Japanese style non-ballasted track form, which, from bottom of rail down is elastomeric fasteners on precast concrete segments over an asphaltic leveling course on the bridge deck, tunnel floor, or at grade concrete slab. The high speed turnouts are German geometry and components other than use of the Japanese rail shape and placed on the German design Rheda concrete base trackform, which track form extends for some distance each side of these turnouts. (Even the rail was rolled in Germany, but to the Japanese shape dimensions.

Now we go to the question of the long section on viaduct.

The northern roughly half of the line is in hilly to mountainous country and the southern half is mostly in flatlands that are rice farmed. The idea of building this portion of the line created a major political uproar. The not long beforehand construction of the north-south “freeway” took quite a wide strip of land and the locals in the area did not want that to happen again. I put freeway in quotes because, even though described as such, it is a toll road. Thus the decision to elevate the line. An elevated line in open country makes the most sense for several reasons: First and foremost , trespass, animals, and other objects on the track virtually disappear. Second, road crossing grade separations require no road work. Third, drainage and underground utilities are unaffected. Fourth , the reason leading to the decision: land parcels are not split and there is no issue with going from one part of your land to the other. Rice or other crops can be planted straight through, with only the reduction in growth due to shading by the structure reducing crop output. Rice is a very labor intensive crop so most of the landholdings are relatively small. And finally, foundations punch through the low strength soil conditions inherent in rice farming. The original track style, thanks to the French was supposed to be ballasted, but early in our participation it was decided to go to a concrete based track form. That is a whole other subject which I will skip for now. With Taipei station as zero, this long viaduct extends from km 179.88 to km 337.20 = 157.32 km. There are 13 other elevated structures over one km long. 73% of the total length of line is elevated, and 13% is in tunnels. There are 47 tunnels in all, the longest of which is 7.36 km.

The south end station is not actually Kaohsiung itself, but a north side suburban station called Zuoying. A downtown Kaohsiung is in the maybe someday category. However, since I left there in 2007, the north end has been extended beyond Taipei Main Station to a new east side of Taipei suburban station called Nangang. As originally opened, there were three stations that had tracks installed but no station structure built. These are now all in service.

For a current schedule, go to 20200801英文時刻 (thsrc.com.tw)


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## George Harris (Jan 3, 2023)

Earthquakes: There have been two derailments of Shinkansen equipment in earthquakes. One was of a complete train in Japan, the other was the last car only of a train in Taiwan. In both cases, everyone literally walked away from the derailment. Being on a concrete base helps, as the train will not dig into the ballast. The Shinkansen equipment has a very low center of gravity which helps reduce the possibility of overturning. JARTS (Japanese Railway Technical Service) has proposed a couple of minor modifications to equipment and track to reduce the severity of the outcome of derailments, which presumably implemented on equipment and track built since that time. The equipment modification is a relatively easy retrofit.

Sonic Boom: With speed ups of trains on the Shinkansen lines if was found that there would be a significantly loud sonic boom that preceded the train on the outbound end of the tunnel. In typical Japanese fashion, they studied this thoroughly. It appears that it only occurs within a certain range of lengths of tunnel, not happening in tunnels either longer or shorter. The precise numbers and conclusions have been kept very close to the chest. Part of the solution is the extremely long duck bill shape of the ends of the higher speed trainsets. Duckbill is not just a nickname. A study of the very minimal waves emanating from a duck or goose plunging its head into water led to scaling up of the shape of a duck's bill and head. There are also some end treatment projections of tunnel ends.


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## v v (Jan 6, 2023)

Thank you George, just re-read these reports, they are fascinating. As mentioned I'm not overly interested in the engineering side of rail but these reports have grabbed my attention, hope you write more.

Why doesn't someone at AU invite you to give talks at a Gathering, if you talk half as well as you write everyone would be spellbound.

Duckbills, how far back does that shape go regards as running in service?
About 9 years ago we travelled from Paris to Madrid using an overnight sleeper express (fantastic) then on to Seville and after a few days to Malaga (both great cities in our opinions but Malaga has the edge for us as it's by the sea). Both Spanish trains were the HS AVE type with huge duckbills, and I guessed the trains were built in Spain as they export train sets don't they?

Some of the comments about the Japanese duckbill Shinkansen came across as though they were fairly recent, have I got that wrong?


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## v v (Jan 6, 2023)

Buying rail tickets at Haneda Airport Terminal 3.

On arrival in Japan we have to get to Akihabara Station in central Tokyo, the obvious way is Monorail to Hamamat Sucho station where we transfer to the Yamanote Line for the remaining 5 stops.

Can we buy a single through ticket or as they are two different rail systems have to buy a ticket for each system?

Thank you.


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