The Shinkansen (新幹線) is a Japanese main-line railway on which trains can run at 200 km/h or more over their main sections.
History
Japanese railways were built to a narrow gauge in the Meiji period, which kept costs low. The narrow gauge, together with hilly land, meant many slopes and curves. From the 1910s to the 1950s the top speed stayed at 100 km/h or less. Proposals to change to standard gauge were made several times from the Meiji to the Taisho period, but none was carried out. Practical high-speed train work began on the South Manchuria Railway (南満洲鉄道, Mantetsu), a company run with Japanese capital and technology in Manchuria, which was then under Japanese influence. Its line used 1,435 mm standard gauge. In 1934 it started the streamlined Asia express (あじあ) between Dalian and Xinjing (now Changchun), a distance of 701 km. It reached a top speed above 120 km/h and took 8 hours 30 minutes.
In the 1930s Japan needed to move more goods to China and Manchukuo, and traffic on the Tokaido and Sanyo lines grew. In 1939 a committee inside the Railway Ministry (鉄道省) proposed the Bullet Train Plan (弾丸列車計画). It would build a new broad-gauge line of 1,435 mm from Tokyo to Shimonoseki, with a top speed of 200 km/h. Tokyo to Osaka would take 4 hours and Tokyo to Shimonoseki 9 hours. The plan was approved in September 1940. Insiders already called it the Shinkansen (新幹線) or the broad-gauge new line, and the word Shinkansen is said to date from this plan. The army raised concerns that enemy attacks on power stations could stop electric trains, so the plan used both electric and steam locomotives. Work went on after the Pacific War began in December 1941, but it stopped when the war turned against Japan. Much of the land had been bought during the war, partly by force, and much of the route was later used for the Tokaido Shinkansen.
After the war, Japan's economy recovered from 1950, when the Korean War began, and demand for intercity trains grew fast. JNR hired many skilled people who had worked for military research units and the South Manchuria Railway. In 1955 Sogo Shinji (十河信二) became JNR president and brought back Shima Hideo (島秀雄) as chief engineer. Shima had studied distributed traction (動力分散方式), in which the cars have motors, even before the war. This kind of train suits Japan's hilly land and weak ground. The 80 series train for the Tokaido Line, developed under Shima in 1950, showed that electric trains could also work well on long routes. From 1953 Japanese railways began to use high-performance electric trains with new technology, such as cardan drive, all-metal lightweight bodies and electromagnetic brakes. In 1957 the Odakyu Electric Railway's SE car, built to aim for 145 km/h, was tested on the Tokaido Main Line and reached 145 km/h, which was a world speed record for narrow-gauge railways at that time. In 1958 JNR built the MOHA 20 series (later the 151 series) for the Kodama express, and in July 1959 a six-car set reached 163 km/h.
From 1955 JNR also worked on AC power. It began AC electrification on the Hokuriku Main Line in 1957. The Shinkansen later used 25 kV AC, a much higher voltage than the 1,500 V DC used on older lines. By 1956 the Tokaido Main Line was fully electrified, but traffic had nearly reached its limit. In 1957 a JNR committee said that more track would be needed. Normally a four-track plan along the existing line would have been chosen, but Sogo and other JNR leaders chose a new broad-gauge line instead. In May 1957 a research institute reported that Tokyo to Osaka in 3 hours was possible on such a line. Many people, including some inside JNR, doubted a separate high-speed line, because the view in the West was that airplanes and expressways would replace railways. The plan was approved in 1958 and groundbreaking took place on 20 April 1959. The cost rose above the first estimate, and this led to a question of responsibility in parliament. Sogo resigned as JNR president before the line opened, and Shima left JNR with him. On 1 May 1961 JNR received a loan from the World Bank, which made the project a national one that could not be stopped for domestic reasons. Land bought and tunnels dug for the wartime plan were used, and the line was finished in five years.
The Tokaido Shinkansen (東海道新幹線) opened on 1 October 1964 as the first Shinkansen line. The opening was timed to the 1964 Tokyo Olympics. JNR built the 0 series trains for it, and a full-size mock-up was shown at the Japan pavilion of the New York World's Fair in April 1964. The model test line at Kamonomiya was near Sagami Bay, where winters are mild, so tests did not cover heavy snow. In the first winter after the opening, snow sticking to trains at Sekigahara caused frequent failures. At opening the top speed was 200 km/h, and it was raised to 210 km/h the following year. The line made day trips between Tokyo and Osaka practical, with time to spend there. Trains grew from 12 cars to 16 cars when the 1970 Osaka Expo opened. In 1967 construction of the Sanyo Shinkansen (山陽新幹線) started as an extension of the Tokaido line. It opened to Okayama on 15 March 1972 and to Hakata on 10 March 1975.
In 1971 construction began on the Tohoku Shinkansen (東北新幹線) and the Joetsu Shinkansen (上越新幹線). In 1974 work began on the Narita Shinkansen (成田新幹線), to serve the airport being built at Narita. Protests and tunnel flooding made the Tohoku and Joetsu lines five years late, and the Narita line was cancelled. Noise and vibration problems, including a lawsuit over the Nagoya Shinkansen, became serious along the line. Fares were raised many times, strikes were frequent, and technical progress slowed for a time. From the 1964 fiscal year JNR's accounts were in deficit, and the deficit kept growing. Some say the Shinkansen helped cause JNR's collapse, but a JR Central chairman argued that the Tokaido line was paid for from internal reserves and borrowing, and that fares alone repaid it. In 1982 the Tohoku and Joetsu lines opened in a temporary form, running to and from Omiya. In 1985 they reached central Tokyo at Ueno. Japanese Wikipedia says the cost of building these lines added to JNR's finances, and under the Nakasone cabinet JNR was split up and privatised in 1987.
After JNR was split and privatised, the Tohoku and Joetsu lines went to JR East, the Tokaido line to JR Central and the Sanyo line to JR West. At first the track was owned by the Shinkansen Holding Organization (新幹線保有機構), which leased it to the operators. In 1991 the three companies began to buy their Shinkansen assets over 60 years. JR East built mini-Shinkansen services that run Shinkansen trains on existing lines without new full-standard track: the Yamagata Shinkansen (山形新幹線) from 1992, the Akita Shinkansen (秋田新幹線) from 1997, and an extension of the Yamagata Shinkansen in 1999. The top speed stayed at 210 km/h for a long time, but in the early 21st century it was 270 km/h on the Tokaido line, 300 km/h on the Sanyo section and 320 km/h on the Tohoku section. Stops were shortened and speeds between stops kept high to save minutes. The Seibi Shinkansen (整備新幹線) lines, frozen at the end of the JNR period, were restarted. The Tohoku Shinkansen reached Shin-Aomori in 2010, the Kyushu Shinkansen's Kagoshima route was fully open by 2011, the Hokkaido Shinkansen reached Shin-Hakodate-Hokuto in 2016, and the Hokuriku Shinkansen reached Tsuruga in 2024. From the late 20th century, more people commuted by Shinkansen. Commuter tickets went on sale in February 1983, and companies began to give commuter passes for it. Because land prices in big cities rose in the bubble period, more people lived in outer areas such as Tochigi, Gunma and eastern Shizuoka and commuted to Tokyo. Rush-hour trains became crowded, and timetables were set for commuters. JR East introduced Max double-deck trains to add seats for each train.
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Written by an AI from the company's history on Japanese Wikipedia, nothing else, and checked by a program for dates and numbers that are not in those facts. It can still be wrong. Adapted from Japanese Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0; this text is shared under the same licence.