> Chris Jackson, the editor-in-chief of Railway Gazette International, based in London, said JR East wanted to raise their maximum train speed to 224 miles per hour to achieve a journey time between Tokyo to Sapporo that rivals flying.
> Currently, the world’s fastest trains in regular service run between Beijing and Shanghai, in China, at speeds up to 217 miles an hour, he said.
Sapporo is over 500 miles from Tokyo, and the trains might be faster than a 600mph plane ride...
When I was in Hokkaido the opening of the track was rumoured for about 2030. (usual disclaimer, you got it from a guy on the internet, etc)
Also, the trip through the Seikan tunnel (the 33.46 miles undersea tunnel connecting Honshu with Hokkaido) enforces relatively slow speeds, since it's shared with other, slower trains. They would probably have to implement significant extensions that it could be approached with Shinkansen speed.
That said, the train trip between Hakodate and Sapporo is a rather nice one. Aided by a Bento box and a couple of Asahis it's a pleasurable experience. Even if you don't have the over-the-top Shinkansen luxury and speed.
On the minus side I had to stay a night in Hakodate, because appart from the first two trains to Tokyo there was no seat available on any other train. No matter in which class, alas, that was the Sunday, which marked the end of golden week.
Hakodate, while certainly not what you expect of magic Japan, has its attractions in its own rights. Especially when you arrive during the end days of the cherry blossom and there's that really great sushi place, which was a lot cheaper than anything comparable in Tokyo.
I digress, most definitely, but - ahh - I really want to go back to Japan.
I can be at my local airport (Baltimore) in less than 30 minutes, and be seated in another 30 minutes if I’m traveling early. If I lived in real America, somewhere like Kansas City or Buffalo, it’d take like 15-20 minutes to get from parking to the airplane.
Even still, the city population was about 880K in 2018, with a metro area of 2.4MM. So even in a US city with a somewhat aggressive annexation policy, still only about ⅓ of the population lives within the city limits. And Columbus has no passenger trains, anyway, neither intracity nor intercity.
Well you also have to commute to train stations.
True enough.
I live almost equidistantly from three international airports, all, nominally (that is without traffic) about 75 minutes drive away.
The closest main train station is a 15 minute bike ride away or a 10 minute drive away (without traffic). Funnily enough the local train station is slightly further away both by car and bike.
Sure, not every country (notably the US) offers such privileged amenities, but where a good train network is available trips up to six hours are definitely doable, if not preferable.
Get to the airport, takes about 1 hour (drive 60k or 40 miles). If you don’t have a car - even longer.
You arrive in advance, security, luggage check in then boarding, then runway.
It’s been around 3 hours so far.
Now you fly for 50 to 70 minutes and it doesn’t include the plane driving through airport after landing.
Get off, grab you luggage - another 40 minutes easily. 15 if you’re lucky.
Now you need to get to the city, so it is 2 hours by car through Moscow traffic or 1 hour using “aero express” train.
The thing is, once you get off this “aero express” train, chances are it is still about one hour trip on subway to the office/apartment.
I used to fly like that, I was leaving my parents apartment at about 4-30am to arrive by 10/11am.
Compare it to train - it takes 13 hours but it leaves from the city centre, no security check in’s no nothing, you take 30 minutes to arrive there. It leaves at 6-30pm, you have supper and sleep. 7-30am BOOM you’re in the center of Moscow right next to subway station. Brush you’re teeth during approach, have your breakfast and off you pop.
It feels muuuuch better on the train. Air travel overhead is just too big - 5 hours or something for hour of the flight time. With train you have about two hours of overhead.
The only thing it is almost twice as expensive compared to air travel