JAPAN NEWS AND DISCUSSION
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In an OECD survey of 36 nations on people's perceptions of their living conditions, Japan ranked 21st in terms of quality of life; Australia, Norway and the U.S. were the top 3. What do you think of that?
( 12 )
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The Fukuoka mayor is banning public servants from drinking alcohol for a month; the Osaka mayor has declared war on tattoos on civil servants. What do you think of all this?
( 21 )
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Why do you think Facebook's stock failed to live up to the hype in its trading debut?
( 13 )
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Which sport, when played well, do you think is the most exciting to watch?
( 62 )
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What's the difference between an average burger and a great one?
( 12 )
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- Business Teaching Positions - Part-time - Kanto Region
- Interac, Tokyo
- Salary: ¥3,000 ~ ¥5,000 / Hour
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- National Relief/Substitute Teacher - summer start
- Interac, Tokyo
- Salary: ¥275,000 ~ ¥300,000 / Month
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- 営業パーソン
- 加治金属工業株式会社, Tochigi
- Salary: ¥240,000 ~ ¥350,000 / Month Negotiable
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45 Comments
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0
foxkenji
as of now, I believe the French have the fastest.
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Kwaabish
In the sense of safety being best, Japan's Shinkansen would prevail over TGV or ICE since there ahave been no deaths in an accident/derailment.
Accuracy in operation would also favour Japan.
IMHO
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Sarge
"the French have the fastest ( trains )"
Yeah, but any plane is still faster.
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ultradodgy
England. The Brits get railed faster than anyone.
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JeffLee
The French/Europeans. It's an open, non-proprietary system, so operators can run anything they want along their tracks. Shinkansen's tracks are dedicated, and extremely expensive to build and maintain to boot.
When overseas clients make a choice based purely on technology and cost, they invariably chose the world-standard European system. When politics and Japan's ODA play a role (ie, Vietnam and Taiwan), then they choose Shinkansen.
(Note, the Hitachi trains sold to Britain are built to meet Euro standards.)
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LostinNagoya
Europe. Shinkansen is safe, but what could one expect of a system that runs such small distances as 300 km? TGV trains on the other hand, run an average of more than 600 km.
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nandakandamanda
LostinNagoya. Are you talking about average distances? One-way? Tokyo to Fukuoka has to be more than 1,000 km one way, and run many times a day, surely.
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Zenny11
Agree with above poster.
300km won't even get you to Nagoya(one-way).
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LostinNagoya
Yes, nanda..., average distances. And Zenny. Osaka to Nagoya: 150 km. Nagoya to Tokyo: 220. 370 km, or less. I am in Brazil right now, and Japan is trying to sell Shinkansen for a distance of more than 2,000 km. According to what TV news are saying, French/German trains are more appropriate for Brazil because TGVs are used to run continental distances, and Japanses trains are seen more as a ultra-fast subway. I know it may be a wrong idea, but that's how they see it here.
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stevecpfc
You can`t beat British Railways, especially the quality buffet cars, an xample to all Johnny Foreigners on how to operate proper rail systems.
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Zenny11
How about Tokyo-Osaka, etc Shinkansen distances?
Many shinkansen go a bit further than the next big town.
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knews
For reliability, cleanliness, efficiency, friendly service and helpful staff, the shinkansen is the best by far.
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ACrowe
Amtrak rules.
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NeoJamal
If the French have the fastest high speed rail that travels over 5000km/h, why is their maximum operating speed limited to 320km/h?
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NeoJamal
If they had a brain to get the right, they would've relied on more aeroplanes over such great distances in the first place instead of 300~350km/h trains
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NeoJamal
If they had the brains to get it right, they would've relied on more aeroplanes over such great distances in the first place instead of 300~350km/h trains
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NationalistRE
Yep, clearly they don't know what they are talking about. But I can put a kind worn in for TGV, they are not designed to minimise noise emissions unlike the ICE 3 or the Shink, so they should be cheaper and most appropriate for traversing through the sparsely populated Brazilian countryside. Also the TGV is prone to fatal accidents so there's no worry in tarnishing a good brand name.
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norinrad21
Germany, Germany, Germany, did i mentioned Germany?
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ronaldk
Japan is certainly in the top 3.
My brother was scheduled to take Amtrak from San Jose to Los Angeles (about 350 miles or so) at 10 am one morning for 7 hour trip. I call him the next day to ask how was the trip and he said he got home at 3am in the morning (17 hours later). Someone had been stabbed on the train before reaching San Jose, the whole line was shut down for investigation, and he waited for his train for about 9 hours. US trains, unfortunately, may be the worst in the world.
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SamuraiBlue
Japan, with it's Super conductive Maglev system and various Shinkansen models, it totally blows the other competition out of the water. The bigger question is who is going to buy it.
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Weasel
Think the better question to ask is, "Which country best utilizes their high-speed rail technology?" I liken the prior question to, "Yeah I own a Veryon Bugatti...but it only runs once a week on a 5 km circle track."
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Speed
Japan. No contest.
Speaking of Amtrak...we arrived 6 hours late from San Diego to Denver. Missed the New Year's countdown by an hour. Got stuck in the middle of the desert for 6 hours due to freezing temperatures.
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ebisen
It is difficult to define "best" but if we talk about "technologically advanced" and "running on time" it is for sure Japan (although TGV and ICE are not THAT far away).
Japan's latest shinkansen train types are the most efficient and silent, and could be the fastest in a very reliable way, should the track allow it...
Every time I had to use the ICE there was a more than 5 min delay for a route not longer than 150 km.
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LaiLaiYuu
Japan ♥
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pointofview
Shinks are great in most cases. Can be a little packed on the wrong day. But if you miss one there is always one not too far behind. Convenient I must say.
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howdizzle
Taiwan, hands down-
Clean, fast, frequent- and no where near the cost of Japan's system for the same distance the price is 1/3 that of Tokyo and all the trains are same or similar models as used in Japan.
Taiwan High Speed Rail. Check it out.
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Badge213
A lot of Amtrak delays are not Amtrak's fault. They are the fault of the freight railroads (not controlled by Amtrak), in the parts where Amtrak actually owns and controls tracks (northeast corridor, and various other small lines) ontime performance is much higher.
Taiwan high speed rail = modified Japanese technology and modified 700 series SHINKANSEN.
Technically speaking, the President of SNCF (SNCF is the French National Railway that operates the TGV) has said that the Japanese Shinkansen is more reliable then the TGV. The TGV uses motorcars at each end to pull/push the train, Shinkansen uses a different mode like EMU (electrical multiple units) where traction motors are distrubuted throught the train instead of being located in the front or end cars. You can see this when the first and last cars of the TGV do not carry passengers, while the Shinkansen's do.
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Proffesor
It's funny that some people answering this question have probarbly not even boarded any of the fast trains. Just base their facts from hear-say.
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Zenny11
Forgot.
One prob I see with shinkansen usage in the USA, brazil, etc is that much of those distances are covered by Diesel engines.
Not sure how feasable a fully electric train might be as the infrastructure might get costly.
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Zenny11
Agree with Badge213.
Bogeys(with EMU) can be easily swapped and also make for room inside the train.
Been on the shinkansen many times, also rode the TGV, ICE and Eurostar.
Many people here seem to talk about price, cleaniness, etc but ignore that the topic is about the technology level.
Granted the TGV travels faster than the japanese shinkansen. But than the shinkansen also travel slower than their top-speed.
Besides speed also noise-level, room per pasenger, etc should be considered too.
And I agree that the EMU is more efficient than the push/pull of the TGV.
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2020hindsight
Maglev is the latest technology for high speed trains and the only real implementation of this is the Shanghai high speed train from the airport.
It used technology from Germany; so Germany has to be the list. Also Japan has researched a lot of this technology and has demonstrated the fastest maglev trip at over 580 kph.
So I would have to say Germany and Japan have the best high speed technology in the world.
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SamuraiBlue
@Zenny11
It is not that easy since EMUs drive system are synchronized so that all motor output level are the same. Without it motor efficiency will drop dramatically which may rendering the train useless because not enough torque is generated in synchronized matter.
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janusj11
JAPAN AND GERMANY!
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Sarge
"who is going to buy it ( the Maglev system )"
Until they can make it for way less than they do now, nobody.
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YuriOtani
America was in the race in the 1960's with its Budd built multiple electric unit trains. It was built to operate at 260km but it speed was limited to 200km per hour due to poor track conditions. A problem that continues today. The best trains in the world today come from Japan. The Americans no longer produce railroad equipment for passenger service. The Shinkansen is smooth as smooth can be.
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telecasterplayer
Every other advanced nation but America.
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Icewind007
It's true that American trains are pretty bad. However, America is just too big to put trains in any more than a local area (such as the northeast).
Personal transportation and planes become more cost effective.
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YuriOtani
Icewind007, Americas problem is the freight railroads do not want passenger service. It would be nice to be able to take the train from Tulsa to Dallas. A high speed train could do this in less than 2 hours. The problem now is the speed of the trains is rather limited (90km) and they are often put on the sidling in favor of freights making them hours late. If the American public had the choice of rail travel a lot more.
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Katsuro1000
JAPAN of course =D
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2020hindsight
Icewind007
You are so so wrong here. America could do with 100% more public transportation which is so much more efficient that personal transportation.
The problem is that America is addicted to the car.
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sfjp330
Japan has the best train. Problem is the high ticket prices. In the U.S., route from San Francisco to Los Angeles, the high speed rail might be profitable in a long term. The project was approved by California voters in 2008, When built, high-speed trains capable of 220 mph (350 km/h) are to link San Francisco to Los Angeles in two and a half hours. Construction to begin by 2012 and the total cost is estimated to be around $45 billion. A great project.
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2020hindsight
One day, it will happen...
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Badge213
The northeast is more then just a "local area", and beside, that is EXACTLY what America is doing now. Some people really need to do some fact checking before they post. No one is building a train system in America from Los Angeles to New York City. What America is doing is building "regional" high speed rail in high desnity areas that are currently underserviced by trains, and where you really can't build anymore roads or runways.
You neglect the fact that many roads, highways and airports in the US are heavily (more then trains) subsidized by the government. Building high speed rail lines are cheaper then building an extra lane of highway or extra runway at the airport. Trains use one-third the energy of airplanes (per person) and a fifth of that used by cars (with one person).
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yukisnowflake
Best Country - Japan.
Worst Country - Canada.
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limboinjapan
I have lived in all 3 major high-speed train countries and by far the most comfortable is ICE and with it technology that allows the wheel base to adjust to different rails it is a lot more versatile (Japan has been trying to develop it own system with little success).
Now Shinkasens would be my number 2 but knowing how poorly they function in bad weather it makes they a bad candidate for countries prone to things like heavy rains, heavy winds, heavy show, something the EMU system is no good at.
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