Oyama Station
Oyama Station is a railway station in Oyama, Japan, operated by the East Japan Railway Company. Oyama Station is served by the following lines. Tohoku Shinkansen Utsunomiya Line Shonan-Shinjuku Line Mito Line Ryomo Line Most up Shinkansen services use platform 4; some trains on the Ryomo Line offering through service to Utsunomiya operate from Platform 9. July 16, 1885: The station opens on what becomes the Tohoku Main Line. May 22, 1888: The Ryōmō Line opens. January 16, 1889: The Mito Line opens. June 23, 1982: The Tohoku Shinkansen opens. List of railway stations in Japan Oyama Station information Guide map for Oyama station
Tōhoku Main Line
The Tōhoku Main Line is a 575.7 km long railway line in Japan operated by the East Japan Railway Company. Although the line starts from Tokyo Station in Chiyoda, most of the long-distance trains begin at Ueno Station in Taitō, pass through such cities as Saitama, Utsunomiya and Sendai, before reaching the end of the line in Morioka; the line extended to Aomori, but was truncated upon the extension of the Tōhoku Shinkansen beyond Morioka, which parallels the Tōhoku Main Line. The 159.9 km long portion of the line between Ueno Station and Kuroiso Station in Nasushiobara, Tochigi is referred to as the Utsunomiya Line. A portion of the Tōhoku Main Line is shared with the Keihin-Tōhoku Line and the Saikyō Line; these lists are separated by service patterns provided on the Tōhoku Main Line. The section between Ueno and Kuroiso is known as the Utsunomiya Line. ●: All rapid trains stop *: Some rapid trains stop |: All rapid trains pass A: Aterui H: Hamayuri ●: All rapid trains stop |: All rapid trains pass KiHa 100 series E531 series EMUs 701 series EMUs 719 series EMUs E721 series/ SAT721 series EMUs HB-E210 series DMUs - Senseki-Tohoku Line 701 series EMUs The construction of the Tōhoku Main Line began in the Kantō region and extended to the north end of Honshu, the city of Aomori.
It is one of oldest railway lines in Japan, with construction beginning in the late 19th century. Until November 1, 1906, the current Tōhoku Main Line was run by a private company Nippon Railway. In 1883, the first segment between Ueno and Kumagaya opened. In 1885, it was extended to Utsunomiya. Following construction of the Tone River Bridge in 1886, Utsunomiya and Ueno were directly connected; the line extended further to the north. In 1891, the segment between Morioka and Aomori opened, creating the longest continuous railway line in Japan. After 1906, the line was nationalized and became the Tohoku Main Line operated by the Ministry of Railways; when Tokyo Station opened in 1925, the Tōhoku Main Line was extended from Ueno to the new station. Until the 1950s, this segment was used and many trains ran through both the Tōkaidō Main Line and Tohoku Main Line. However, when the Tohoku Shinkansen opened, it occupied land used for the tracks of mid and long-distance Tohoku Main Line trains; as a result, only a small number of commuter lines such as the Keihin-Tohoku Line now operate to Tokyo from the north, making Tokyo Station's status as part of the Tōhoku Main Line somewhat circumspect.
This is set to change in March 2015 when the under-construction Ueno-Tokyo Line is completed, facilitating through service between the Tōkaidō Line and the Utsunomiya and Joban Lines. In 2002, the Tohoku Shinkansen was extended from Morioka to Hachinohe and the operations of the local track segment between those two cities was turned over to Iwate Ginga Railway and Aoimori Railway. With the extension of the Tōhoku Shinkansen to Shin-Aomori station in 2010, the segment between Hachinohe and Aomori was delegated to the Aoimori Railway Company; the shortened Tōhoku Main Line is now the second-longest line in Japan, after the Sanin Main Line. The Tokyo to Omiya section was double-tracked between 1892 and 1896, extended to Furukawa in 1908, Koyama the following year, to Utsunomiya in 1913; the Iwanuma - Sendai - Iwakiri section was double-tracked between 1920 & 1923 and the Utsunomiya - Iwanuma section between 1959 and 1964. The Iwakiri - Morioka - Aomori section was double-tracked between 1951 and 1968, including the 17 km realigned section between Iwakiri and Atago in 1962.
The 7 km Tokyo to Tabata section was electrified at 1,500 V DC in 1909, extended to Akabane in 1928, Omiya in 1932 and Kuroiso in 1959. Electrification was continued north at 20 kV AC, reaching Fukushima in 1960, Sendai in 1961, Morioka in 1965, Aomori in 1968. Hasuda Station: The Bushu Railway operated a 17 km line to Kamine from 1924 until 1938. Mamada Station: A 2 km 610 mm gauge handcar line to Omoigawa operated between 1899 and 1917. Hoshakuji Station: A 12 km line servicing the Utsunomiya Army Airfield operated between 1942 and 1945. Ujiie Station: An 8 km 610 mm gauge handcar line operated to Kitsuregawa between 1902 and 1918. Yaita Station: The Tobu Railway opened the 24 km 762 mm gauge Tobu Yaita Line to Shin Takatoku on 1 March 1924; the line was converted to 1,067 mm gauge in 1929, closed on 30 June 1959. Nishi-Nasuno Station: A 15 km line was opened by the Shiobara Railway to Shiobara in 1912; the line was electrified at 550 V DC in 1921, closed in 1936. The Higashino Railway opened a 24 km line to Nasu Ogawa between 1918 and 1924, the line closing in 1968.
At Otawara Station, it connected with the 762 mm horse-drawn tramway mentioned below for the three years they were both open. A 5 km 762 mm gauge handcar line to Otawara opened in 1908. In 1917, it was converted to a horse-drawn tramway, but closed in 1921. At Otawara Station, it connected with the Higashino Railway line mentioned above. Shirakawa Station: A 23 km line to Iwaki Tanakura was opened by the Shirotana Railway in 1916; the line was nationalised in 1941, closed in 1944. Plans to reopen the line in 1953 resulted in a decision to convert the line to a dedicated busway, which opened in 1957. Koriyama Station: The Fukushima Prefectural Government operated a 13 km 762 mm gauge line to Miharu between 1891 and 1914. Matsukawa Station: A 12 km line to Iwashiro Kawamata operated from
Japan Railways Group
The Japan Railways Group, more known as JR Group, consists of seven for-profit companies that took over most of the assets and operations of the government-owned Japanese National Railways on April 1, 1987. Most of the liability of the JNR was assumed by the JNR Settlement Corporation; the JR Group lies at the heart of Japan's railway network, operating a large proportion of intercity rail service and commuter rail service. Despite JR East, JR Central, JR West and JR Kyushu now having full private ownership, Japanese people talk about "private railways" as if none of the JR Group companies is part of them, since they are successors of Japanese National Railways Maps always denoted JR and private railways differently, as does JR itself; the group consists of seven operating companies and two other companies that do not provide rail service. The operating companies are organized into six passenger operators and a nationwide freight operator. Unlike some other groups of companies, the JR Group is made up of independent companies, it does not have group headquarters or a holding company to set the overall business policy.
The six passenger railways of the JR Group are separated by region. Nearly all their services are within the prescribed geographic area. However, some long-distance operations extend beyond the boundaries; the Shirasagi train service between Nagoya and Toyama, for instance, uses JR West rolling stock but the segment of track between Nagoya and Maibara is owned by JR Central, whose crew manage the train on that section. Japan Freight Railway Company operates all freight service on the network owned by JNR. In addition, the group includes two non-operating companies; these are Railway Information Systems Co. Ltd.. To cover various non-railway business areas, each regional operator in the JR Group has its own group of subsidiary companies with names like "JR East Group" and "JR Shikoku Group." JR maintains a nationwide railway network as well as common ticketing rules that it inherited from JNR. Passengers may travel across several JR companies without changing trains and without purchasing separate tickets.
However, trains running across the boundaries of JR companies have been reduced. JR maintains the same ticketing rules based on the JNR rules and has an integrated reservation system known as MARS; some types of tickets, such as Japan Rail Pass and Seishun 18 Ticket, are issued as "valid for all JR lines" and accepted by all passenger JR companies. In 1987, the government of Japan took steps to divide and privatize JNR. While division of operations began in April of that year, privatization was not immediate: the government retained ownership of the companies. Privatization of some of the companies began in the early 1990s. By 2006, all of the shares of JR East, JR Central and JR West had been offered to the market and they are now publicly traded. On the other hand, all of the shares of JR Hokkaido, JR Shikoku, JR Kyushu and JR Freight are still owned by Japan Railway Construction and Technology Agency, an independent administrative institution of the state; the demise of the government-owned system came after charges of serious management inefficiencies, profit losses, fraud.
By the early 1980s, passenger and freight business had declined, fare increases had failed to keep up with higher labor costs. 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 and debts not absorbed by the successor companies and to execute other activities relating to the breakup, such as outplacement of former personnel. The new companies introduced competition, cut their staffing, 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% from 1986, while the passenger sector had been stagnant since 1975. The growth in passenger transport of private railways in 1987 was 2.6%, which meant that the Japan Railways Group's rate of increase was above that of the private-sector railways for the first time since 1974. Demand for rail transport improved, although it still accounted for only 28% of passenger transportation and only 5% of cargo transportation in 1990.
Rail passenger transportation was superior to automobiles in terms of energy efficiency and of speed in long distance transportation. The six companies had 18,800 km of routes in use in the late 1980s. About 25% of the routes were in double-track and multitrack sections, the rest were single-track. In 1988 about 51% of the six companies' 1,000 locomotives were diesel, the rest were electric. Japan Freight Railway Company owns its locomotives, rolling stock and stations, but hires track from the six passenger companies, it runs fewer trains on less track than Japanese National Railways freight service did before its demise, but at increased revenues and higher productivity. The Shinkansen Property Corporation leased Shinkansen railway facilities, including 2,100 km of 1,435 mm gauge high-speed track, to the passenger companies on Honshū. In 1991, the SPC was reorganized into the Railway Development Fund and the three operators bought their lines on 60-year loans; some of the Shinkansen electric-powered
Ryōmō Line
The Ryōmō Line is a Japanese railway line connecting Oyama in Tochigi Prefecture with Maebashi in Gunma Prefecture. 84.4 km long, the line is operated by the East Japan Railway Company. The name refers to the fact that Gunma and Tochigi prefectures were once part of an ancient province called Keno, split into Kōzuke and Shimotsuke; this line connects both halves of the old province. Most Ryōmō Line services terminate at Takasaki on the Joetsu Line. Local trains run about once in an hour during the day between Oyama and Maebashi and twice or three times as between Maebashi and Takasaki; some rapid services from Ueno and the Shōnan-Shinjuku Line travel through onto the Ryōmō Line, but they stop at every station. Akagi limited express services travel to Maebashi from Shinjuku. On the weekdays some Akagi services are branded Swallow Akagi; the following train types are used on the Ryōmō Line. 107 series 115 series 185 series 211 series 651 series E231-1000 series E233-3000 series EMUs The Oyama to Kiryu section was opened in 1888 by the Ryomo Railway, extended to Shin-Maebashi the following year.
The company merged with the Nippon Railway in 1897, that company was nationalised in 1906. This article incorporates material from the corresponding article in the Japanese Wikipedia. Stations of the Ryōmō Line
Ikebukuro Station
Ikebukuro Station is a major railway station located in the Ikebukuro district of Toshima, Japan, shared by East Japan Railway Company, Tokyo subway operator Tokyo Metro, the two private railway operators Seibu Railway and Tobu Railway. With 2.71 million passengers on an average daily in 2007, it is the second-busiest railway station in the world, the busiest station in the Tobu and Tokyo Metro networks. It serves commuters from Saitama Prefecture and other residential areas northwest of the city centre, it is the Tokyo terminal of the Tobu Tojo Line. Seibu Ikebukuro Line TJ Tobu Tojo Line Ikebukuro Station has two main entrances, the East exit and the West exit. There are a number of other secondary entrances such as the JR North exit, the various Seibu exits, multiple subway exits; the JR lines run north/south through the center. The Tobu platforms are to the northwest and the Seibu platforms are to the southeast. Both Tobu and Seibu operate department stores adjacent to their terminal stations.
The Marunouchi Line and Yurakucho Line run east/west two stories underground, while the Tokyo Metro Fukutoshin Line is four stories underground to the west of the main station complex. The latter line runs south toward Shinjuku and Shibuya along Meiji-dori, offers through services to Motomachi-Chūkagai Station in Yokohama via the Tokyu Toyoko Line and Minatomirai Line. Tokyo Metro's Echika underground mall is located inside the station. Chest-high platform edge doors were introduced on the Yamanote Line platforms on 2 March 2013; the Tobu station has three terminating tracks served by platforms 1 to 5, arranged as shown in the diagram on the right. Platforms 3 and 5 are used for disembarking passengers, although platform 5 is used for passengers boarding the evening TJ Liner services, which require payment of a supplementary fare. From 14 June 2015, the departure melodies used when trains are about to depart from the station are to be changed to classical themes, with "Allegro" from "Divertimento in D major, K. 136" by Mozart used for platforms 1/2, "Menuetto" from "Eine kleine Nachtmusik" by Mozart used for platforms 3/4, "Allegro ma non troppo" from the "Pastoral Symphony" by Beethoven used for TJ Liner services departing from platform 5.
Chest-high platform edge doors are scheduled to be added by the end of fiscal 2020. Platform doors protecting platform 1 are in use since 21 April 2018, it is planned to have platform doors protecting platforms 2 and 3 in operation from 2 March 2019. There are three sets of ticket barriers giving access to the platforms: the "South Gate" at ground level, the "Central Gate" and "North Gate" on the first basement level. Platforms 1, 4, 6 are used for disembarking passengers only; this station consists of three separate island platforms for the Marunouchi Line, Yurakucho Line, Fukutoshin Line. The Tokyo Metro platforms are equipped with chest-height platform edge doors; the station was opened on April 1903 by the Japanese Government Railways. The Tōjō Railway Line station opened on 1 May 1914 with the opening of the 33.5 km line to Tanomosawa in Saitama Prefecture. As the Tokyo terminus of the line was planned to be at Shimo-Itabashi, Ikebukuro Station is to this day marked by km post "-1.9". Tobu opened a department store adjoining its station on 29 May 1962.
Around the same time, the Tobu station platforms were expanded with three tracks. In March 1992, automatic ticket barriers were installed at the north exit of the Tobu Station, in June of the same year, the Tobu Department Store was expanded with the addition of the Metropolitan Plaza annex located on the south side. In June 2008, the Tobu station ticket barriers were colour-coded into three "zones": North and South. Chest-height platform edge doors were installed on the Tokyo Metro Yurakucho Line platforms in January 2011; the figures below are the official number of passengers entering and exiting each day released by each train operator. Annual passenger figures for the station between fiscal 1903 and 1965 are as shown below. Note that the figures only consider boarding passengers and a blank indicates that no data is available; the daily passenger figures for the JR East, Seibu and Tokyo Metro station after fiscal 2000 are as shown below. Note that the JR East figures only consider boarding passengers whereas the Seibu and Tokyo Metro figures consider both entering and exiting passengers.
The surrounding Ikebukuro district is a major commercial centre. Seibu department store, Sunshine City and Bic Camera are located to the east of the station, while the Tobu department store and Metropolitan Plaza are located to the west. Rikkyo University Tokyo College of Music Teikyo Heisei University Ikebukuro Campus Tokyo University of Social Welfare Ikebukuro Campus Shukutoku University Ikebukuro Satellite Campus Tokyo College of Transport Studies Toshimagaoka-joshigakuen Junior and Senior High School Seibu Department Store Parco Department Store Tobu Department Store Sunshine City Hotel Metropolitan Centurion hotel Ikebukuro Toshima Tax Office Toshima Civic Centre Tokyo Metropolitan Theatre Ikebukuro Library Ikebukuro Fire Station Higashi-Ikebukuro Stati
Japan
Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies off the eastern coast of the Asian continent and stretches from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and the Philippine Sea in the south; the kanji that make up Japan's name mean "sun origin", it is called the "Land of the Rising Sun". Japan is a stratovolcanic archipelago consisting of about 6,852 islands; the four largest are Honshu, Hokkaido and Shikoku, which make up about ninety-seven percent of Japan's land area and are referred to as home islands. The country is divided into 47 prefectures in eight regions, with Hokkaido being the northernmost prefecture and Okinawa being the southernmost one; the population of 127 million is the world's tenth largest. 90.7 % of people live in cities. About 13.8 million people live in the capital of Japan. The Greater Tokyo Area is the most populous metropolitan area in the world with over 38 million people. Archaeological research indicates; the first written mention of Japan is in Chinese history texts from the 1st century AD.
Influence from other regions China, followed by periods of isolation from Western Europe, has characterized Japan's history. From the 12th century until 1868, Japan was ruled by successive feudal military shōguns who ruled in the name of the Emperor. Japan entered into a long period of isolation in the early 17th century, ended in 1853 when a United States fleet pressured Japan to open to the West. After nearly two decades of internal conflict and insurrection, the Imperial Court regained its political power in 1868 through the help of several clans from Chōshū and Satsuma – and the Empire of Japan was established. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, victories in the First Sino-Japanese War, the Russo-Japanese War and World War I allowed Japan to expand its empire during a period of increasing militarism; the Second Sino-Japanese War of 1937 expanded into part of World War II in 1941, which came to an end in 1945 following the Japanese surrender. Since adopting its revised constitution on May 3, 1947, during the occupation led by SCAP, the sovereign state of Japan has maintained a unitary parliamentary constitutional monarchy with an Emperor and an elected legislature called the National Diet.
Japan is a member of the ASEAN Plus mechanism, UN, the OECD, the G7, the G8, the G20, is considered a great power. Its economy is the world's third-largest by nominal GDP and the fourth-largest by purchasing power parity, it is the world's fourth-largest exporter and fourth-largest importer. Japan benefits from a skilled and educated workforce. Although it has renounced its right to declare war, Japan maintains a modern military with the world's eighth-largest military budget, used for self-defense and peacekeeping roles. Japan is a developed country with a high standard of living and Human Development Index, its population enjoys the highest life expectancy and third lowest infant mortality rate in the world, but is experiencing issues due to an aging population and low birthrate. Japan is renowned for its historical and extensive cinema, influential music industry, video gaming, rich cuisine and its major contributions to science and modern technology; the Japanese word for Japan is 日本, pronounced Nihon or Nippon and means "the origin of the sun".
The character nichi means "sun" or "day". The compound therefore means "origin of the sun" and is the source of the popular Western epithet "Land of the Rising Sun"; the earliest record of the name Nihon appears in the Chinese historical records of the Tang dynasty, the Old Book of Tang. At the end of the seventh century, a delegation from Japan requested that Nihon be used as the name of their country; this name may have its origin in a letter sent in 607 and recorded in the official history of the Sui dynasty. Prince Shōtoku, the Regent of Japan, sent a mission to China with a letter in which he called himself "the Emperor of the Land where the Sun rises"; the message said: "Here, I, the emperor of the country where the sun rises, send a letter to the emperor of the country where the sun sets. How are you". Prior to the adoption of Nihon, other terms such as Yamato and Wakoku were used; the term Wa is a homophone of Wo 倭, used by the Chinese as a designation for the Japanese as early as the third century Three Kingdoms period.
Another form of Wa, Wei in Chinese) was used for an early state in Japan called Nakoku during the Han dynasty. However, the Japanese disliked some connotation of Wa 倭, it was therefore replaced with the substitute character Wa, meaning "togetherness, harmony"; the English word Japan derives from the historical Chinese pronunciation of 日本. The Old Mandarin or early Wu Chinese pronunciation of Japan was recorded by Marco Polo as Cipangu. In modern Shanghainese, a Wu dialect, the pronunciation of characters 日本; the old Malay word for Japan, Japun or Japang, was borrowed from a southern coastal Chinese dialect Fukienese or Ningpo – and this Malay word was encountered by Portuguese traders in Southeast Asia in the 16th century. These Early Portuguese traders brought the word
Akihabara Station
Akihabara Station is a railway station in Tokyo's Chiyoda ward. It is at the center of the Akihabara shopping district specializing in electronic goods. Akihabara Station is served by the following lines. JR East: Tōhoku Main Line JK Keihin-Tohoku Line JY Yamanote Line Sōbu Main Line JB Chūō-Sōbu LineTokyo Metro: H Tokyo Metro Hibiya LineMetropolitan Intercity Railway Company: Tsukuba ExpressThe above-ground section of the station is cross-shaped, with the Chūō-Sōbu Line tracks running from east to west, the Yamanote and Keihin-Tohoku Line from north to south. There are two island platforms serving four tracks for the Yamanote Line and the Keihin-Tohoku Line on the 2nd level, two side platforms serving two tracks for the Sobu Line Local service on the 4th level. Chest-high platform edge doors were installed on the Yamanote Line platforms in May 2015, to be brought into operation from 20 June 2015. There are two underground side platforms serving two tracks; the song "Koi Suru Fortune Cookie" by AKB48 is to be used as the departure melody on the Hibiya Line platforms from spring 2016.
There is an underground island platform serving two tracks. Akihabara Station was opened in November 1890 as a freight terminal linked to Ueno Station via tracks following the course of the modern day Yamanote Line, it was opened to passenger traffic in 1925 following the construction of the section of track linking Ueno with Shinbashi via Tokyo Station and the completion of the Yamanote Line. The upper level platforms were added in 1932 with the opening of an extension to the Sōbu Line from its old terminal at Ryōgoku to Ochanomizu, making Akihabara an important transfer station for passengers from the east of Tokyo and Chiba Prefecture; the huge growth in commuter traffic following the Second World War caused considerable congestion and was only relieved with the construction of the Sōbu line tunnel linking Kinshichō with Tokyo, bypassing Akihabara. The Hibiya Line subway station was opened on May 31, 1962, with the line's extension from Naka-Okachimachi to Ningyōchō. On August 24, 2005, the underground terminus of the new Tsukuba Express Line opened at Akihabara.
The entire station complex, including the JR station, was refurbished and enlarged in preparation for the opening of the Tsukuba Express. In fiscal 2013, the JR East station was used by an average of 240,327 passengers daily, making it the ninth-busiest station operated by JR East. Over the same fiscal year, the Tokyo Metro station was used by an average of 122,576 passengers daily, making it the 23rd busiest Tokyo Metro station; the passenger figures for previous years are as shown below. Note that JR East figures are for boarding passengers only; the main attraction is the Akihabara electronics retail district to the north and west of the station. Iwamotocho Station Suehirocho Station Cha 51.
