I love travelling by train and wherever I can, I do so. Japan is all about rail travel and of course, the country is world renown for its network of high speed or bullet trains, the Shinkansen. On our trip, we'll get to ride on four different Shinkansen trains and I'm really looking forward to it! As far as I'm concerned, a trip to Japan would not be complete without a ride on a Shinkansen train.The word Shinkansen literally means new trunk line, referring to the tracks, but the name is widely used inside and outside Japan to refer to the trains as well as the system as a whole. The Shinkansen network is operated by five Japan Railways Group companies with each company being responsible for a rail segment.
Starting with the 130 mph (210 km/h) Tokaido Shinkansen in 1964, the now 1,528 mi (2,459 km ) long Shinkansen network has expanded to link most major cities on the islands of Honshu and Kyushu with trains operating at speeds up to 186 mph (300 km/h). Contrast those speeds to that of Amtrak's Acela Express trains which are the only true high-speed trains in North America; the highest speed they can attain is 150 mph (240 km/h), though they average less than half of that. It's no wonder rail travel is not popular in the US - you're barely going faster than a car.
Today, the Tokaido Shinkansen is the world's busiest high-speed rail line carrying well over 150 million passengers a year! Though largely a long-distance transport system, the Shinkansen also serves commuters who travel to work in metropolitan areas from outlying cities.
This being Japan, it's also not surprising that the Shinkansen is extremely reliable with average arrival times less than 10 seconds, not minutes but seconds of the scheduled time. This is after having taken into account delays due to all natural and human accidents and errors and is calculated over roughly 160,000 Shinkansen trips completed. Unbelievable!! No way that any train system, rail or subway, in the US could ever come close to that performance record. Ironically, I've had to relax a bit on scheduling our train rides because I'm so used to padding the amount of time we need to accommodate for possible delays.
Equally amazing to the Shinkansen's speed and reliability is its safety record. In the Shinkansen's 45 year, nearly 7 billion passenger history, there have been no passenger fatalities due to derailments or collisions, despite frequent earthquakes and typhoons. The only derailment of a Shinkansen train in passenger service occurred during an earthquake 2004 but there was not a single casualty. As a result of that single incident, trains are now equipped with detection devices that will immediately bring the train to a hard stop in the event of an earthquake.
Based on our itinerary, most of our travels on the Shinkansen will be on the Tokaido line and riding the Shinkansen Hikari train. The Hikari is the train shown in the photo at the top of this posting. It would have been really nice to travel on the Shinkansen Nozomi train, which is the fastest of all the Shinkansen trains, but unfortunately, the fare is not covered in our two week JR Railway Pass. Maybe on my next trip to Japan :-)
When I first got the tour itinerary from Mike at Samurai Tours, the cost included door-to door baggage transfer services (takuhaibin) that would deliver our suitcases from one town to another as we traveled by rail. We would just board the Shinkansen train with a small carry on bag.
I couldn't figure out why we would need to pay for a luggage delivery service until I read that the overhead shelves on Shinkansen trains are about 40cm (15 inches) high and 60 cm (23 inches) which is not large enough a space to accommodate the large suitcases that tourists typically travel with. Luckily, we plan to travel very lightly so we're not availing ourselves of the luggage delivery service. Just hope there's enough legroom in front of our seats where we can plop our luggage! *fingers crossed*
I'm looking forward to all the train rides we'll be taking in Japan. If you're planning a trip to Japan and intend to travel by rail, be sure to check out Hyperdia which provides information on JR train routes and schedule.
