Things That Wow Me About Living in Tokyo Part 2

This is the second part of my article about living in the future(Japan). In the first part, I wrote about the tap-and-go experience, offline payments, and other things. In Part 2, I will discuss three fascinating aspects of Japan.

To summarize:

1. The value of one minute in Japan is crucial. Missing a train by just one minute could cost you an additional five minutes.

2. Japan has vending machines for everything, including hot food and drinks. They are available everywhere, even in places where you wouldn’t expect them.

3. Smart parking lots are equipped with indicators that show free parking spaces and those that require coins.

Now, if you’re still reading, here’s my take on these three aspects that I find incredibly interesting.

The Train System and the Importance of Timing

Railway transportation has been available in Japan since the late 1870s, and the country introduced bullet trains that can reach a top speed of 320 km/h (199 mph) back in 1964.”

But this is not about the history of railway transport but to show how long the system has been around and know how Japanese like to be efficient, the likelihood that this system moves 15 million people every day and over 6.9 million of these in Tokyo alone, the train system is truly efficient and hence the value of time.

The train line is divided into;

Local train; this will stop on every station along its line up to the last station

Semi-Express; this will have a stop at every station up to a major station and skip the remaining station to the final

Express, this will stop on fewer stations compared to the Semi Express and also might move faster than the Semi express

A typical train stop guide showing which stations the different trains will stop or skip

There is almost a train coming every 5–10 minutes or so depending on the line and time of day, if you’re not at the platform by the time the train doors open, you’re likely to miss that train, because it will stop for less than a 1 minute on some stations if the train you missed was your connecting train to another line so that you can take a faster train, you’ll miss the other train as well.

I’ve come to learn that mistakes or falling short on time cascades throughout your day in Japan as everything runs on time, even the izakayas

The interconnection between the bus transport with the train schedule is very interesting, the bus will always get you to the station at the right time for the next train. So in Japan don’t be late unless it is intentional.

Vending Machine For Anything and Everywhere.

Thanks to the high safety levels in Japan, you won’t walk long before you find a vending machine for cold and hot drinks at the next turn, even in places you would least expect them.

Look around and even where it might seem abandoned there is a vending machine fully stocked and functional, but that is not all, there is a vending machine for a warm bowl of noodles, a vending machine that will give you ice cream, and one try for lottery it choose what to give you.

You can never go hungry or thirsty, but I’ve realized that depending on their location, the prices will either be higher or lower.

In the last post, I talked about the IC card, well you can pay with an IC card on a vending machine, just tap and choose your drink.

Smart Parking Spots

We once took a road trip with friends towards a place called Hakone, and we came across this spot, a major stopover where most people get to, buy omiyages (Souvenirs), refreshments, and snacks for the road, of course being Japan this place was filled with cars, driving in and out and you cannot see the end of the parking.

To my surprise, as we turned into the parking, there was an LED sign showing us which row to turn into as there was a parking spot ahead, it took the guesswork and spending time going in circles looking for parking.

Time based and coin operated parking spots

Then there are the paid-for parking spots on the streets and in designated parking and again both cash, coin, and IC card operated. For designated parking spaces they have these ground-fitted units that cannot drive over after parking over it until the payment is done, [I think] they also do the time calculation for how much you will pay since its per hour.

Tokyo Street Parking Toll Machines.

So that is for this article and will be sharing more as I get to fully take in the technology, and way of life in this big city of Tokyo.

Thank you for reading.

If you have heard something about Tokyo or Japan and you would like me to write about it, do suggest it in the comment section.

Bye for now.