Why didn't JR East keep the Yamaha melodies and roll them out system-wide? I honestly think they sound better than the Teichiku, Switch or Toyo Media Works melodies that are currently used. Also, why does Mito have them? What's so special about Mito? (Not sarcasm, I genuinely don't know.)
>> Shinjuku melodies (started March 11, 1989; replaced with Teichiku melodies between 1999~2001): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBEyQ0v5b4E>> Mito melodies: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHDkaPhr96A>>1747231 >>1749401Interesting question. I'd like to know as well. I wonder if anyone who's taken the surface trains in Tokyo, or 外国のdensha weebs can talk about where the bottlenecks are, and why they're bottlenecks. (Land shortage? Landowners not willing to sell their land to JR/private railways? Close to big universities? Just really, really densely populated?)
I know the Seibu Line looked pretty bad from the videos/photos I saw on YT and Twitter. Especially at Nerima, Hibarigaoka and Shakujiikoen in the morning. This is even with the existence of express tracks and Yurakucho/Fukutoshin thru services which surprised me.
Nippori-Toneri Liner is also fucked, because JR East cheaped out and built an AGT budgetbahn instead of conventional heavy rail (plans came off JNR's debt crisis and the mid-90s Japanese recession). Might work for Vancouver which is, for the most part, low-density suburbia (look at Nanaimo, 29th Avenue, Royal Oak and 22nd Street if you don't believe me) but Adachi Ward is simply too dense for AGT to work. In 2020, Nippori-Toneri was the most congested line in Japan, with Akado-shogakkuen~Nishi-Nippori at 140%.
Interestingly, both Nippori-Toneri and Saikyo Line were constructed to appease landowners who were pissed about the Tohoku Shinkansen going through their areas. I wonder...did JNR cheap out on the Saikyo Line as well? Maybe that's why it was so crowded before Covid.
