|
Japan Railroads and Subways
Railroads were long the most important means of
passenger and
freight transportation, ever since they were established
in the
late nineteenth century, but from the 1960s they were
rivaled in
usage by road transportation
(see Roads
, this ch.;
table 22, Appendix). The relative share of railroads in total
passengerkilometers fell from 66.7 percent in 1965 to 42 percent in
1978,
and to 29.8 percent in 1990. By contrast, automobiles and
domestic
airlines were carrying ever-larger shares of the passenger
traffic
in 1990
(see Civil Aviation
, this ch.;
table 23, Appendix).
At the heart of Japan's railroad system is the Japan
Railways
Group, a government-subsidized group of eight companies
that took
over most of the assets, operations, and liabilities of
the
government-owned Japanese National Railways in 1987.
Initially, the
companies remained in the public domain, but privatization
began
for some of the companies in the early 1990s. There were
six
passenger companies: the East Japan, West Japan, and
Central Japan
railroad companies, which operated in Honshu, and the
Kyushu,
Shikoku, and Hokkaido railroad companies, which operated
on the
islands for which the companies were named. In addition,
the East
Japan Railway Company, since the opening of the Seikan
Tunnel
between Honshu and Hokkaido in 1988, also provided express
service
to Sapporo. Similarly, the Central Japan Railway Company
started
serving Shikoku after the 1990 completion of the
Seto-Ohashi
bridges, a system of seven bridges linking Honshu and
Shikoku. The
six companies had 18,800 kilometers of routes (mostly
1.1-meter
track) in use in the late 1980s. About 25 percent of the
routes
were in double-track and multitrack sections, and the rest
were
single-track. In 1988 about 51 percent of the six
companies' 1,000
locomotives were diesel, and the rest were electric.
Another
company, Japan Freight Railway Company, owned its
locomotives (295
diesel and 569 electric locomotives in 1988), rolling
stock, and
stations but hired track from the six passenger companies.
It ran
fewer trains on less track than Japanese National Railways
freight
service did before its demise but at increased revenues
and higher
productivity. The eighth company, the Shinkansen Property
Corporation, leased Shinkansen ("bullet" train) railroad
facilities--including 2,100 kilometers of 1.4-meter gauge
highspeed track--to the passenger companies on Honshu. Some of
the
Shinkansen electric-powered trains operated at speeds up
to 240
kilometers per hour.
Another nearly 3,400 kilometers of routes, mostly
1.1-meter
gauge, were operated by major private railroads and by
what are
known in Japan as third-sector railroads--new companies,
financed
with private and local government funds--which absorbed
some of
Japanese National Railways' rural lines. There were
twenty-seven
private and third-sector companies in 1989.
What remained of the debt-ridden Japanese National
Railways
after its 1987 breakup was named the Japanese National
Railways
Settlement Corporation. Its purpose was to dispose of
assets not
absorbed by the successor companies and to execute other
activities
relating to the breakup, such as reemployment of former
personnel.
The demise of the government-owned system came after
charges of
serious management inefficiencies, profit losses, and
fraud. By the
early 1980s, passenger and freight business had declined,
and fare
increases failed to keep up with higher labor costs. The
new
companies introduced competition, cut their staffing, and
made
reform efforts. Initial public reaction to these moves was
good:
the combined passenger travel on the Japan Railways Group
passenger
companies in 1987 was 204.7 billion passenger-kilometers,
up 3.2
percent from 1986, while the passenger sector previously
had been
stagnant since 1975. The growth in passenger transport of
private
railroads in 1987 was 2.6 percent, which meant that the
Japan
Railways Group's rate of increase was above that of the
privatesector railroads for the first time since 1974. Demand for
rail
transport was improved, although it still accounted for
only 28
percent of passenger transportation and only 5 percent of
cargo
transportation in 1990. Rail passenger transportation was
superior
to automobiles in terms of energy efficiency and of speed
in longdistance transportation.
In addition to its extensive railroads, Japan has an
impressive
number of subway systems. The largest is in Tokyo, where
the subway
network in 1989 consisted of 211 kilometers of track
serving 205
stations. Two subway systems served the capital: one run
by the
Teito Rapid Transit Authority, with seven lines (the
oldest of
which was built in 1927), and the other operated by the
Tokyo
metropolitan government's Transportation Bureau, with
three lines.
Outlying and suburban areas were served by seven private
railroad
companies whose lines intersected at major stations with
the subway
system. More than sixty additional kilometers of subway
were under
construction in 1990 by the two companies. As of 1989,
there also
were full subway systems in Fukuoka, Kobe, Kyoto, Nagoya,
Osaka,
Sendai, and Yokohama. Hiroshima and Kobe had light rail
systems,
and Osaka, in addition to its subway, had an intermediate
capacity
transit system (rubber-tired motor cars running on
concrete
guideways). Like Tokyo, all of these cities also were well
served
by public and private railroads.
Data as of January 1994
|
