JAPAN - Tokyo Part 2.2 (feat. Chiba)

Crowds of people moving between Tokyo main station complex and the Keiyo Line underground station

Day 2 (3 May 2016)

The second day started with another agglomeration of crowds, first on a fully packed Chuo train into Tokyo station, then an endless flow of masses down into the Keiyo Line station, some 400 m, to get a train to Disneyland. With the bad experience on the Enoden on the previous day, I just tried to get a few nice pictures of the Disney Monorail, but didn't even try to get a ticket to ride on the circular route. Maybe it would have been easy, but maybe not. And there were full train loads arriving from Tokyo and the other direction.

Disney Monorail, also accessible without a ticket for the theme parks

So I moved on to more deserted places, first Chiba, which looked like everybody had gone on holiday. At Minato-Chiba I was certainly not the first who tried to get a perfect picture with a JR Keiyo Line train and the Chiba Monorail side by side in the same shot, but it would be a miracle, with JR arriving every 15 minutes and the Monorail with irregular headways (line 1 every 15 minutes and line 2 every 12 minutes!). So I put the camera on the railing at the end of the platform, and hopefully I can merge the images to get the perfect picture. After getting a day pass for 620 Yen from the machine, I jumped on the first train available only to get off at the next station for some nice outdoor shots. The shorter Line 1 to Kencho-mae (in fact, the line numbers are not visible anywhere) was barely used that day, I think there were only two trains shuttling back and forth. The view down into the street as it heads for Chiba station is amazing because the train kind of flies above the streets. Also the junction east of Chiba is stunning, a super-structure which certainly from street-level looks a bit too much. Later the line down to Kencho-mae has a certain Wuppertal feel as it runs above a canal.

Wuppertal in Japan?

By the way, compared to Wuppertal, where the Schwebebahn has on one arm that runs on a single wheel - I mean several wheels, but all in one row - the Chiba suspension railway runs more quietly, doesn't swing so much from one side to the other, I would suppose it even has some special counter-wheels to prevent that, just when it switches from one track to the other it gets a bit more Wuppertal-ish. What was more annoying was some abrupt braking as if an automatic brake was applied as soon as the manually driven train reached the allowed speed.

Young female driver operating the quiet shuttle to Kencho-mae

Later I took the entire Line 2 out to its eastern terminus. This line was quite well used, no surprise it serves a typical day-out destination, the Chiba Zoo (Dobutsu-koen). On the way back I got off at Tsuga to take a JR Sobu Line train back towards Toyko.

 Shin-Keisei Line: pink route through the western Chiba suburbs

But that was not the last special transport system of the day. Though due north from Tsuga, it required a bit of a detour to get there. I decided for the pink Shin-Keisei Line from Shin-Tsudanuma to Kita-Narashino to see a bit of the Toyo Rapid Line, which in reality is a suburban extension of the Tokyo Metro Tozai Line, but in Japan it can't be called just that. Trains on this line, however, run only every 15 minutes, but it deserves the adjective "rapid", and the underground stations I came through looked quite pleasant. And it's also expensive, for 5 stations I had to pay some 450 Yen on my PASMO card. 

Outer terminus for the Toyo Rapid Line, actually the end of the Tozai Metro Line

From the end of that line two stops further out on a Keisei Local I arrived at Yukarigaoka to see the Yukarigaoka Line! 

Old-fashioned peoplemover through a Chiba new town

This is probably the oldest and least-known of all rubber-tyred guided transit systems in Japan! Luckily there was a yound guy at the entrance, because like the SkyRail near Hiroshima, this system is not prepared for foreigners. It does not accept IC cards, and the ticket machines are only in Japanese. Well, you have to put 200 Yen into the slot and then press the key that says "200", and you get a tiny Paris-style ticket. It's difficult to get a view out the front window as they front is inclined and low. I took a trip around the racket-shaped route and got off one stop prior to the departure point, took some photos and walked through a department store back to the Keisei station. Unfortunately, there was no staff at that stop, so the ticket barrier swallowed my ticket.... Eventually, the Keisei Main Line and the JR Chuo-Sobu Local brought me back to my temporary home at Iidabashi.

Go back to Tokyo Part 2.1 | Go to Tokyo Part 2.3

JAPAN - Tokyo Part 2.1 (feat. Shonan)

Returning to Tokyo after more than two weeks (read about my initial impressions here) through the southern parts of the country already felt like coming back home, no need for new orientation which a new city always requires before one gets settled (and it's already time to move on...). Anyway, with a full week ahead, I still felt stressed wondering if I would manage to do everything I still wanted to do. To avoid getting from one thing to the other in a very confusing way, I'm writing this down in a more diary-style way:

Day 1 (2 May 2016)

Shonan "Schwebebahn" near northern terminus at Ofuna

I started the first day by taking a JR train down to Ofuna, south of Yokohama, to explore the Shonan region. The Shonan Monorail was fun to ride. This is actually a single-track Schwebebahn, a bit like the H-Bahn at Düsseldorf Airport or the one at Dortmund University, but with a driver and even a conductor on board. The choice of this mode was probably correct considering the many curves and gradients the railway has to negotiate. As PASMO is not accepted yet, I bought a single ticket from end to end (unfortunately on exiting, the machine eats the ticket, so if you want to keep it, you'd better exit through the manned gate and ask if you can keep it!). And stupid as I am, I didn't double-check in our own book to see that I should have bought a Shonan Explorer ticket at the JR station, this would have given me a day pass for the Monorail and the Enoden for just 700 Yen, besides the local JR lines, but for these I had my Rail Pass anyway.

Due to the alignment described above, the ride is a bit shaky, but not too much. The funny thing about this line is that the intermediate stations apparently have no ticket gates, so the conductor has to check tickets, and therefore he jumps out of his rear cabin, and if the exit happens to be at the wrong end, he runs forward, and later back again. While I was looking whether any of the stations would be a good point to get off for a few photos, we had already arrived at the southern end in Enoshima. The terminus is something like on the third floor of what from the outside looks like a rather pathetic building.

 Enoden at Hase station - not a common view, but a funny coincidence

From the terminus you just follow the crowd down the road and if you happen to be there in holiday season like me (most Japanese have their Golden Week right now), you'll see a huge crowd trying to get tickets or waiting for the next train of the Enoshima Electric Railway (short Enoden). I got my day pass easily from the machine, but first went down to the beach (honestly, I'd rather keep to my Spanish beaches also in the future...) and then returned to the street-running section to the east of Enoshima station. Luckily, I didn't have much difficulty to jump on a westbound train at Koshioge, the next stop east of Enoshima, so I'd be on the train before the busiest station. But things got much worse later on, when after a few shots along the coastal route I needed to go to Kamakura. Hase station was at the verge of collapsing (there is an important Buddha statue nearby), so I walked to the next stop, squeezing myself into the next train as if I were on the Ginza Line during rush hour and eventually made it to Kamakura. For obvious reasons, I just wanted to escape the holiday crowd, and left all possible sightseeing for another trip.

Enoden's Kamakura terminus with loads of people trying to exit the station

Instead I headed for the third curious rail line in the area, the Seaside Line, yet another rubber-tyred driverless guided transit system. I went from Kamakura via Ofuna and the JR Negishi Line to Shin-Sugita, the northern terminus of the Seaside Line. 

Seaside Line: Rubber-tyred driverless line at Namikikita

The name suggests quite a lot, and in fact the southern third of the route is quite nice with views of the harbour and Kanazawa bay, but the rest is rather dull, alongside a major motorway or through industrial estates. Like with similar systems in Hiroshima or Osaka, the ride is not bad, but not too smooth either.

Seaside Line: alignment on the southern stretch

Previous stop: Nagoya | Go to: Tokyo Part 2.2

JAPAN - Nagoya Subway

Higashiyama Line - Sakae station: busiest line, busiest station

When I arrived in Nagoya from Kyoto (just around an hour by Shinkansen) on 29 April 2016, I wondered whether I should walk to my hotel or take the Subway for two stops. Lazy as I am (and curious for yet another metro) I made my way down to the Sakura-dori Line (red line), used my PASMO card to walk through the gates but was rather disappointed that on a Friday evening, around 7pm, I have to wait for 10 minutes for the next train. With luggage that is getting heavier as I pick up leaflets and maps etc. one appreciates lifts and escalators, and also the station maps available in most Japanese metros to choose an exit with escalators. Everything seems fine, until you realise that the indicated escalator leaves you halfway up to the surface. No return either, because there is no down escalator anyway - and I wasn't the only one caught in that trap.

Aonami Line - ready to depart from Nagoya station

The next morning with the sun out, I got a 1-day pass (cheaper on weekends, just 600 Yen - available also from the machines, but I don't know if it gives you the same nice ticket you get from the ticket window, with a subway map printed on it). But to take advantage of the nice weather, I first headed for the Aonami Line, which is a separate suburban line (with its separate fare, of course), leavings from a dedicated platform at Nagoya station. I checked in with my PASMO card and rode the train until I saw a good place to take some photos, which I found at Nakajima. I didn't exit the station but returned to the last but one stop where I exited, Sasashima Raibu. Unfortunately this was not a good place to take pictures at this time of the day, and the JR station I was hoping to find there according to my own badly-drawn map on UrbanRail.Net, I walked back to Nagoya station. Later I realised that Kintetsu actually has a very primitive stop not too far from there. Like the Linimo (see below), the Aonami Line is shown on many Subway maps, but it is not integrated in its fare system. It was quite busy in the outbound direction on a Saturday morning, which I found surprising. So they could increase the off-peak headway, which is now a train every 15 minutes.

At Nagoya station, I was quite confused as I had no idea where all these JR trains went to. It's hard when you are not properly prepared and don't know the locations shown on train indicators. Eventually I managed to identify a local train on the Kansai Line that would stop at Hatta, an interchange with the Subway and Kintetsu. I took a Kintetsu Local back into town, curious to find out where their underground terminus is located. The trains actually pass below the JR tracks and then terminate underground on the eastern (city) side of the railway station.

Sakura-dori Line - Maronouchi station

During the day I used the Subway on various stretches without exploring it systematically. All in all, it is rather standard, nothing special I would remember except of the thin headways. Just the Higashiyama Line (yellow) is busier (somehow I would always think that the red line by default needs to be the busiest in any city...), running every 4 minutes even on a Saturday, whereas the Sakura-dori (red) and Tsurumai (blue) Lines only ran every 10 minutes. Also the purple Meijo Line, the only real metro circle line in Japan, but this one is doubled on its most important section through the city centre (which I suppose would be defined by Sakae station) by the Meiko Line. The red and yellow lines have platform gates, whereas on the purple and blue lines you can get nice train photos in all the stations (although I wonder if they are going to retrofit gates here, too).

I used the purple line to reach one of the most absurd of all Japanese metro lines I have seen, the Kami-Iida Line (sometimes written as Kamiiida), which only consists of two stations, and is shown as such on maps and can therefore also be used with a Subway day pass.

Kami-Iida Line - ridiculous 2-station "line"

All trains, however, ignore this fact and continue on the Meitetsu Komaki Line. So why on earth can't they just incorporate it simply into this line? Meitetsu has another underground city terminus right next to Sakae. I suppose the Kami-Iida Line was once supposed to continue further south into the city centre. Right now, it only runs every 15 minutes during off-peak hours, so rather a suburban line than a metro. So, being inside the Subway system with my day pass, I rode a Meitetsu train for a few stations and back again, because there were more weird things to explore still while the sun was shining.

Yutorito Line - extravagant elevated busway

The Yutorito Line, possibly the most extravagant means of transport I have seen so far in Japan - this is guided busway similar to the O-Bahn in Adelaide, running 6.5 km on an elevated structure. So I was expected something Brisbane-like, with a bus rolling past every minute. However, there is a bus every 10 minutes only, and it's a short bus, and in 2016 it's a high-floor bus, which despite its high floor has few seats with enormous space being occupied by the huge wheels. And something I hadn't seen on a city bus since the age of Ikarus buses in the (European) East, the driver changes gears manually. So in case he gets bored because there is no need to steer the bus, he is kept busy changing gears. But anyway, I suppose this is the most expensive transport infrastructure for the amount of passengers it is meant to carry. At least they should introduce some low-floor articulated buses to make it worthwhile. But better still, convert it into some sort of light rail.

Driverless Linimo maglev train returning from siding at the outer end of the line

Moving on in a clockwise direction on the purple line, and with a change to the Higashiyama Line (once again it's the zoo station that is decorated with animals to make it different from the rest), I reached the Linimo, another fancy transport system. This maglev system was built for the Expo 2005 and has survived. It's fun, the stations are like basic monorail stations, and the ride is smooth, but nothing too exciting either. I guess a properly built wheel-to-rail system (and railways are usually properly built in Japan) provides almost the same quality of ride, so I don't see the advantages. I don't know about operating costs, but certainly an isolated technology must be more expensive to maintain. It was probably one of those demostrator lines for a technology no one acquired in the end.

Higashiyama koen - zoo station

I finished the day with some photos in the Subway which you will hopefully see on the website one day if I get the time to make a little gallery.

Meijo Line - circle line without platform gates

On the following day I still had a bit of time before moving on to Tokyo, so I jumped on a Toyota train, I mean on a train to Toyotashi, the car-building city east of Nagoya. This line is directly integrated with the Tsurumai Subway Line, so I didn't bother to get a ticket, just stayed inside the station and returned to Nagoya. With a final trip to Nagoyako (port) I eventually managed to ride the entire circle line. Interesting to note that unlike most other circular lines, which circle around the city centre, this one actually runs right through the city centre and the circles around the eastern suburbs. The directions, i.e. which platform is best for which destination on the circle line is perfectly shown at mezzanine level, a bit like or even better than in Madrid.

Mapwise Nagoya is slightly better than Osaka, on demand, they do have an English A4 multipage brochure which I later also found in the tourist office, but nothing as nice as Tokyo or Fukuoka. Inside trains, display types vary from train to train.

By the way, along with the metros of Sapporo and Sendai, and many tram systems, Nagoya will be featured in our second volume of our series "Metros & Trams in Japan" (North & Centre), hopefully out in 2017!

Previous stop: KYOTO | Next stop: TOKYO(Part 2)

LINKS

Nagoya City Transport

Nagoya on UrbanRail.Net (feat. map)

JAPAN - Kyoto Subway

While I liked Osaka quite well as a city, I was a bit disappointed by Kyoto, but this was probably not the city's fault, but the situation in which I arrived. I took a Super Express from Osaka in the morning of Friday, 29 April, leaving at 9:00, which was packed completely, and me being squeezed in for half an hour with all my luggage with me to continue to Nagoya in the evening. Once I got to Kyoto, it was suddenly cold and windy, as if I had travelled 300 km to a different climate zone. Thousands of people were queuing to get off the platform, but as happens so often with stations designed by some super-renowned architect, they tend to be unpractical, and so is Kyoto's. It is impressive once you get into the main hall, but still not a very pleasant place as the wind blows through it. But I took all those escalators up to the roof from where you can get quite a nice view south and north.

As there was not much time for sightseeing anyway, and later the rain was even less encouraging to do that, I escaped into the Kyoto underworld. I got a day pass (600 Yen; for a bit more, also a day pass for subway+city bus is on offer), but the day pass is not available from machines, just from station clerks, and show a nice traditional motif on them. I took the Karasuma Line north to its terminus at the Congress Center, a very green area. There are lots of trains which belong to the Kintetsu Railway, which operates through the entire line and in the south connects directly to the suburban line to Nara (but also Subway trains continue beyond the southern terminus and provide local suburban service). The stations are all pretty plain, but o.k., the busiest have been equipped with half-height platform gates.

Kintetsu train in service on Karasuma Line

 Karasuma-Oike: the busiest stations have been equipped with platform gates

The second line, the Tozai Line, is newer and looks quite different. I haven't seen its trains properly, because they are hidden behind full-height platform screen doors, which resemble those on Tokyo's Namboku Line. Each station is in a different colour, but once again, the colours are nice but meaningless. They start with yellow at the western terminus and become increasingly red and finally purple, which does not help at all to distinguish two neighbouring stations, because they may just have two slightly different shades of pink. Just the last two stations in the southeast, which opened later, break this system (with pale tones), as probably someone had told them, that the initial idea was nonsense. 

Misasagi: typical station design for the Tozai Line

Uzumasa-Tenjingawa: narrow platform section

The station name and number can easily be read from the train, as there are also signs on the outside of the platform screen doors. Otherwise the stations look pleasant, but are much too small, cramped with staircases and escalators - it appears that staircases in Japan always have massive walls, and in the end the platforms get very narrow in those areas. The Tozai Line also has through operation, but Subway trains do not leave the tunnel (I believe), just the local Keihan trains to/from Hamaotsu join the Tozai Line at Misasagi, which is a bi-level station with two island platforms.

Randen: a light railway in the western districts

From the end of the Tozai Line, at Uzumasa-Tenjingawa, I took the Randen, a light railway, back to Omiya. The station at Uzumasa-Tenjingawa was probably built when the metro was extended from Nijo, and features proper platforms. With lots of people changing here, the Randen has mobile ticket inspectors on the platform. The other stops along the route looked rather pathetic, though with a concrete step rather than a platform to board the old high-floor trains. This little system has its own fare, of course, but modern IC cards can be used.

Hankyu's underground Kyoto terminus at Kawaramachi

Instead of walking back into the centre from Omiya in the light rain, I took the underground Hankyu, which within Kyoto seems to provide a kind of metro service, though with lots of express trains going directly to the last two stations in Kyoto. Also Keihan has several underground stations along its north-south route through the city, but I didn't get a chance to see these.

Having so many visitors, Kyoto has large English maps available, which show all major bus routes, but the Subway lines are hard to identify.

Kyoto was my last stop regarding cities which will be covered in our third volume of our trilogy "Metros & Trams in Japan" (West & South), due to be released in 2018. Apart from all the metro systems I have visited, it will, of course, also include the numerous tram systems in this region.

Previous stop: OSAKA | Next stop: NAGOYA

LINKS

Kyoto City Transport Info

Kyoto Subway at UrbanRail.Net (feat. map)

JAPAN - Osaka Subway

Cosmosquare - western terminus of the Chuo Line, probably Osaka's nicest Subway station

While I have actually moved on (this blog is now several days behind), a few notes on Osaka, where I stayed for three days (well, in fact five, but two were reserved for Kobe and Kyoto), but three days were not enough to explore this city's urban rail network thoroughly. But I did what I could, rode on all 8 Subway lines and did get a proper look at the "New Tram" as well as the Osaka Monorail. And a bit of JR and private railways, too.

To buy a one-day Subway ticket from ticket machines was no problem. Upon entering the first time at Honmachi (or sometimes spelt as Hommachi), I thought that they have a very nice way-finding system, but later I had to realise that this has not been implemented in many places yet, but I hope it will. It uses strong colours and instead of the Subway logo in the respective line colour, it uses the line letter in a colour circle, probably inspired by the New York City Subway.

The next thing that surprised me was that most lines only run every 8 minutes during off-peak hours, I think just the Midosuji Line is more frequent, but then this line is quite different from the others anyway, it's the most Tokyo-style line with 10 cars and almost always overcrowded. This is quite an interesting issue as it happens in several other cities, too. The very first line remains the busiest, even though many other lines have been built to actually relieve it. Apparently, a first line is always designed to serve the busiest corridors, but if there is just one such corridor and anything a few blocks away is considered too far, then the overcrowding will persist. Theoretically, Osaka's grid-like network should be good, but there are some lines, especially the latest addition in the east, the Imazatosuji Line, that carries probably only a quarter of the passengers that use the Midosuji Line; and it was built in a rather scaled-down form. To give it more reason to exit, it should at least be extended to represent a sort of outer semi-circle line.

Midosuji Line's northbound Umeda station, not just during rush hour!

Kyobashi station, on the Nagahori Tsurumi-ryokuchi Line, one of the two linear metro lines

The Imazatosuji Line (or line 8 as it is internally known, too) is one of two of these linear-motor metro lines, the other being the Moscow Line (I call it that because it has a Moscow-style silly excessive name which reads as Nagahori Tsurumi-ryokuchi Line!). But as I said in previous blogs, I don't like those linear metros, I don't see the savings and the advantages. As disadvantages, the cars are smaller (though not really much smaller than a Berlin large!-profile train), and they rattle excessively. So if a small-scale metro is what they want, I'd go for the Copenhagen-style driverless type, because at least you can provide a very frequent service and save a lot on driver's wages.

Indeed, the Nagahori Tsurumi-ryokuchi Line has an absurdly long name, especially as the other lines at least for locals seem quite logical, as they refer to the main street the line runs along in the city centre, so this one could simply be the Nagahori Line. Station architecture is quite functional like everywhere in Japan, the overall appearance is more Berlinesque than in Tokyo, less shiny, though no graffiti, of course.

Kyobashi station - some murals add a little extra design, here cherry blossoms...

"New Tram" on ramp towards Cosmosquare

Luckily, the Nanko Port Town Line is now fully integrated into the Subway system, so no extra ticket is required. It connects with the Chuo Line at Cosmosquare in a bi-level station, the Chuo Line on the lower and one floor up you'll find the "New Tram", as it is also known. The funny thing about this driverless guided system is that the cars look like shrunken metro cars; other such systems have stylish or futuristic designs, this one has a Japanese metro car design. As it links two metro lines, a trip is always worthwhile to enjoy the view over this redevelopment area. At the other end, the Nanko Line terminates in an elevated station, but it's directly connected to the underground mezzanine of the Yotsubashi Line via stairs and long escalators.

One day I was joined by German expat Oliver M. and we headed for the Osaka Monorail, which despite its name, I think, runs mostly outside Osaka on a tangential route through the northern suburbs. It could be the only monorail system with a branch line, but I'm not quite sure now. Like Kitakyushu, this is a conventional straddle-beam monorail, and the ride is quite smooth. With a train every 10 minutes it could actually run more frequently as it is well patronised. Before you get on it, you have to pay some additional fare also for any line that takes you to a monorail station, as the Subway 1-Day Pass will not reach that far, although the Midosuji Line actually intersects with the Monorail at its northern end, Senri-Chuo. But as this is Japan, the last few stations on the red line are not proper Subway, so for a few stations more you'll need to pay an extra. But you could do that as you exit the Subway gates at Senri-Chuo, where the interchange is actually quite long, and through the typical shopping mall. We took a Keihan train from their centrally located Oebashi station, and this left us at the Monorail's eastern terminus.

The Monorail junction at the Expo Memorial Park is quite interesting, as if it had been laid out for the northern branch to be the main line. So now, despite a grade-separated junction (I wonder what a flat monorail junction would look like), trains from the northern branch that terminate on the central "track" of the 3-track station, have to cross the main "track". During certain times, those trains continue to Senri-Chuo, and then they use the outer platform edges here.

 Old-fashioned rolling stock on Osaka Loop Line

A few words on the JR suburban services: they are one step ahead of Tokyo and have assigned letters to their routes, a letter which is even clearly shown on trains, which already made my life a bit easier. The loop line, for example is O, the main line from Kobe via Osaka to Kyoto is A, or the underground Tozai Line is H. It is still confusing sometimes, because a train can switch from A to H, for example, or the loop is used by other services, too, but I would consider it a big step forward. Unlike in Tokyo, the Loop Line shares tracks with other trains, which (being not too familiar with the outer branches) seem to loop around Osaka and then continue on one of the branches, like starting at Tennoji, looping counterclockwise back to Tennoji and out towards the southeast.

JR Tozai Line: Osakajokitazume station (only station without platform gates), with train displaying 'A' destination (main line to Kobe)

Although it is on my UrbanRail.Net map, I wasn't really too aware of the Tozai Line (East-West Line), maybe because it doesn't really play the role such a Passante is supposed to play. There is a train every 7 minutes, and during off-peak the trains are not empty, but nothing like the Osaka Loop Line either, which is pretty busy at all times. In fact, many people coming in from the east, change at Kyobashi to the ring line. At the huge Osaka/Umeda hub, the Tozai Line's station is near, but carries a different name, Kitashinchi, so people may not perceive it as part of the complex, maybe it should be called Umeda minami (South Umeda) to be in line with the adjacent Subway stations. And at Nishi Fukushima, strangely it does not provide proper interchange with the loop line station Fukushima, which is only one block away. A pedestrian tunnel should not be so difficult to build, considering that a square mile around Osaka station is all subterranean malls. And even in the station and on the surface, the existence of the other station is not clearly signed.

By the way, while trying to do that transfer, I found a crowd outside Fukushima station: I felt a kind of satisfaction when I learned that operation on the entire loop had collapsed due to a power failure! Who would have expected that in this perfect railway land?

Regarding maps, Osaka is not too good. When you ask, they hand out A4-sized sheets with the map printed in English on one side, and in Japanese on the other side. The letter type used sometimes makes it difficult to read the map. The maps posted inside stations are much better. What is quite confusing, is what is proper Subway and what is outside the day pass area. On the northern Midosuji Line, the stations are still numbered the same way, but shown in a different style, the same with the eastern Chuo Line, but this difference is not explained. Connecting Hankyu routes on the Sakaisuji Line, however, are shown in a different style.

Tram upgrading going on at Tennoji terminus

I don't want to say much about Osaka's remaining Streetcar system (Hankai Line), what I saw was rather pathetic. At Ebisucho, hardly anyone was waiting for the next tram (20-minute headway) during rush hour, and when I got to Tennoji, I found a very "Eastern European" terminus, but next to it they were finishing a new terminus, plus several hundreds of metres were rebuilt, probably opening in a few months. But again like in Melbourne, the terminus is a single stub, so like now, trams may have to wait until they can actually get into the terminus to let people get off. This line was actually rather busy on a late morning, so I rode it out to Kaminoki, from where I took a Nankai train back into their busy Namba terminus.

Previous stop: KOBE | Next stop: KYOTO

LINKS

Osaka Subway at UrbanRail.Net (feat. map)

JAPAN - Kobe Subway & Guided Systems

Subway train at Tanigami terminus, 7 km beyond the line's actual terminus

While in Osaka for a total of five nights, I went on a daytrip to nearby Kobe (28 April 2016). Osaka and Kobe are linked by three parallel railways, so I had to make my choice. As I had already been on some Hankyu trains, I decided to take a Hanshin train, also because it would take me directly to the Rokko Liner, one of the two automatic guided transit systems I wanted to check out. Still in the morning rush hour (yes, trains also get pretty packed in the outbound direction) I jumped on a Limited Express at Umeda, realising later inside the car that actually all trains stop at Uozaki, where transfer to the Rokko Liner is provided via an encased elevated walkway.

Rokko Liner at Sumiyoshi terminus

Although the weather was looking rather horrible and not inviting to leave a station to take pictures from outside, I still decided to get a combined 1-day ticket for Rokko and Port Liner for 1200 Yen. Having looked at the options on the internet the day before, this was not too difficult at the machine, because this is the first system I find in Japan where ticket offices are not permanently staffed. Again, if someone wanted to just ride the train it would probably be enough to get the cheapest ticket, ride to the end of the line and then back to the other end, Sumiyoshi, which is an interchange with the JR line. Trains were running every few minutes and were quite busy. Although the last stop is called Marine Park, there is not much there, but the view from the elevated route is quite nice, especially the harbour crossing with its red suspension bridge where the guideways for either direction diverge to run alongside car lanes on the outer side of the bridge structure. And while the other stations have a simple, though rather wide island platform, the staton south of this bridge, Island Kitaguchi, has a sort of V-shaped platform. The stations are numbered R01-R06, and can also be identified by a symbol, like in Fukuoka. The symbol's pale colour is also visible in the line diagram above the platform screen doors, but this colour is not seen elsewhere in the station.

Portliner approaching Naka-koen

Technologically, the Rokko Liner as well as the Port Liner are similar to Yurikamome in Tokyo, i.e. a driverless train or rubber tyres. Like in Hiroshima, the ride is not bad, but could be smoother. Inside, the cars feel too small, as they only have a very narrow gangway between carriages, not really an open-space design.

While the Rokko Liner operates in the eastern suburbs of Kobe, the longer Port Liner actually starts at Kobe's main transport hub Sannomiya, right next to the JR station and near the Hankyu station, the underground Hanshin station and the two subway stations. The Port Liner uses rather new rolling stock in 6-car formation, whereas the Rokko Liner only has four cars in each train. Initially both systems had a similar route length, with the Port Liner running in an anti-clockwise loop around the new development area on Port Island. Later a branch was added, which has become the main line. Maybe 2 out of 3 trains go to the airport, with the other one doing the loop and returning to Sannomiya. The Port Liner is pretty slow on its first section as it winds its way through some elevated motorway junctions before it catches full speed across the harbour. As a result of its expansion, most stations have side platforms (as initially on the loop they only had a platform on one side). Naka Koen has three platforms, i.e. two side platforms on the same level on the main route, plus another half-island platform on top of the main inbound track for trains returning from the loop. The inbound guideways merge only north of Naka Koen station on the approach to the harbour crossing. At either end of the main line, trains can switch to either side before entering the station, there are no sidings beyond the termini. At Kobe Airport they seem to normally use the southern guideway. On the loop, Naka Futo actually features an island platform, too, I suppose the eastern track is only used by trains entering from the depot. As with the Rokko Liner, despite the new trains, the ride is a bit humpy, the concrete guideway showing its age and having been repaired in some sections, so again, a bit like a bus on an irregular roadway. Stations here are numbered P01 etc, and the numbers are even announced in English along with the station name.

Hanshin train terminating at Kobe's Sannomiya underground station

Before exploring the Subway proper, a short note on Kobe's Passante, a railway tunnel running rather parallel to the main Subway line, the Kobe Kosoku Line, which was built by a third-sector company, but is shared by three different private railways, the Sanyo, Hanshin and Hankyu Railways. Together they provide quite a metro-style service. Adding Kasuganomichi on the Hanshin route, there are nine underground stations in sequence. The Hankyu route joins the Hanshin route just before Kosoku Kobe station.

Sanyo train at Kokosu Kobe on Kobe's "Passante"

Older Subway train at Shin-Nagata

So while the suburban lines join to form a metro in the city centre, Kobe's main Subway line has a rather suburban character, especially along its western leg, the Seishin part of the Seishin-Yamate Line. Distances between stations here are rather long and many sections are on the surface, though interrupted by some tunnels due to the hilly terrain in the Kobe hinterland. The line colour green is also visible in the livery of all the trains of which there are at least three different generations, all looking a bit dated now. I was quite impressed by the design of the first station I saw, namely Itayado, with its wall panels imitating wood:

Itayado station on Seishin-Yamate Line

 Most other stations also have the flair of the 1970s or 1980s, some could do with a little refurbishment. The last station on the western leg, Seishin Chuo, somehow reminded me of Stockholm, a partly underground layout with two island platforms and a medium-sized shopping centre on top with a big concrete square in the middle. On one side there is a large bus terminal. Towards the other end, Sannomiya seems to have been refurbished not too long ago, with whitish enamelled panels providing a well-illuminated space. Here the respective platforms lie on top of each other (to Shin-Kobe on the upper level). Although not really included in my Subway-only day pass I had acquired for 820 Yen (by the way, this is not available from the ticket machine, just from the person at the counter!), I rode the train all the way out from Shin-Kobe to Tanigami, a 7 km tunnel through a mountain range. As long as you don't exit the station no one cares. You can actually change to a Shintetsu train at the same platform without having to pass through a ticket gate.

 < Subway logo - white U on blue blackground looks familiar....

While the Seishin-Yamate Line is a standard metro (using a kind of Madrid-style tram-like overhead catenary), the newer Kaigan Line is another of those linear motor metros I have now already seen in Fukuoka and Osaka. Again, the trains rattle too much for a modern metro system, a bit like a cheap low-floor tram with loose wheels. This one is also manually driven and has no platform screen doors, but unlike the Seishin-Yamate Line, which still has a conductor in the rear cabin managing the doors, the Kaigan Line features one-man operation. The easternmost of just four cars is reserved for women at all times! The Seishin-Yamate Line has such a car somewhere in the middle. I haven't seen it in rush hour, but during the day it was very little used. Like the Nanakuma Line in Fukuoka, it is badly integrated with other transport at Sannomiya, again you have to walk through a shopping mall to transfer. So, again, I wonder why they chose this technology instead of making it compatible with other lines.

Shin-Nagata, the nicest station on the Kaigan Line

In Kobe, unfortunately it is impossible to get proper maps, not even for the two Subway lines alone. A railway network map showing all different services is urgently needed here.

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LINKS

Kobe at UrbanRail.Net (feat. map)