T Railway Technology Today 11 (Edited by Kanji Wako ... Japan Railway & Transport Review 24 • July...

50 Japan Railway & Transport Review 24 • July 2000

Technology

Technolo gy

Copyright © 2000 EJRCF. All rights reserved.

Introduction

This article describes passenger servicetechnologies on Japanese railways. Themain topics are trends in seat reservationsystems (especially for express trains),automatic ticket machines in stations, andautomatic fare collection systems, such asautomatic ticket checking machines.Ticket systems using contactless IC cards,which have the potential to revolutionizepassenger services, are also described.Another recent topic is making railwayfacilities barrier-free in order to facilitatetheir use by elderly and disabled people.Some of these activities are also described.

Characteristics of JapaneseRailway Environment

The decision about what passengerservices to provide, and what technologiesand systems to develop in order to achievethese services is closely linked to acountry’s railway environment. Adistinguishing characteristic of Japan’srailway environment is the existence ofmany railway companies (for example,the JRs and other publicly and privatelyowned railways), forming a complexnetwork providing high-density, high-

volume passenger transport typified by themetropolitan areas, especially Tokyo.Passengers commonly change betweenlines run by different companies to ridefrom a suburb well outside Tokyo, into theheart of the city, and then out to anothersuburb, all without ever stepping outsidea station.This kind of commuter network hasdeveloped in the major cities, but the JRs’high-speed shinkansen services on standardgauge also link major cities. Theshinkansen lines are linked to narrow-gauge express lines at main stations,forming a railway network linking everymajor city in Japan. In addition to the JRs,most larger private railways also operateexpress train services with reserved seating.The JRs alone offer over 1 million reservedseats each day, and these seat reservationsmust be managed efficiently.All entrances to Japanese train stationshave ticket barriers, unlike many stationsin Europe, the USA and elsewhere, wheretickets are not checked between enteringthe station and boarding the train, withtickets being collected on board.However, with the exception of some low-traffic lines in rural areas, this method isnot used in Japan, partly due to historicalprecedent and partly because on-boardticket checking is almost impossible

during rush hours due to the extremelyhigh density of passengers.This environment makes speed andaccuracy the first requirements for ticketreservation and automatic fare collectionsystems. If automatic ticket machines andticket-checking gates are unable toperform as needed, stations would soonbe in chaos. Companies in the JR groupbegin accepting seat reservations at 10:00one month before the reservation day, andeach day’s reservation requests aretransmitted from over 8000 terminalsnationwide. The number of reservationrequests is really high around the NewYear and other holidays so the computersystems must be high performance andhighly reliable or else glitches are reportedon TV and in newspapers.Platforms at Japanese stations are usuallybuilt level with the train floor, making itpossible to board without having to stepup or down. However, these platformsare rarely built at ground level, passengersmust use stairs, escalators, and lifts to getfrom ground level outside the station tothe platforms. If the station is elevated(over the tracks), the up and down walkingdistance becomes significant. This is amajor problem for elderly and disabledpassengers and even for passengerscarrying heavy items. This problem is said

Railway Technology Today 11 (Edited by Kanji Wako)

Passenger Service TechnologiesKoichi Goto

Old ledger-based ticketing system (JR Systems) Latest MARS terminal for automatic seat reservation and ticketing (JR Systems)

51Japan Railway & Transport Review 24 • July 2000Copyright © 2000 EJRCF. All rights reserved.

to be driving passengers away from trainsto cars, so it must be solved if passengerservices are to be improved.

Ticket Reservation System

The old ticket reservation system was runby people, telephone lines, and ledgers.When there was a reservation request fora train, the station staff would transmit therequest to the office that managed thereservation ledger for that train bytelephone. The person at that office wouldthen look up the ledger for the train inquestion, and if there were seats available,would record the reservation in the ledger.If a seat was available, the station staffwould hand-wri te a t icket . Thephotograph on p. 50 shows a turntableused to switch between ledgers quickly.Although this system was designed toallow more seating reservations to behandled, there are clear limitations onhow far a manual system can be taken.In the 1950s, the Japanese NationalRai lways ’ research inst i tute— thepredecessor of today’s Railway TechnicalResearch Inst i tute (RTRI)—beganresearching a computerized seatreservation system. An online system wasbuilt whereby computer-managed files

replaced ledgers, and computer terminalsreplaced telephones, but at the time, therewas nothing similar in all Japan. In fact,this system represented a world first. Theresearch started with the most fundamentalaspects of the system, including thecomputer hardware. As a result, the firstticket reservation computer made up of12 terminals called MARS 1 was installedin the ticket office of Tokyo Station in June1959. At that time, the system could onlybe used to make reservations and couldnot issue tickets, but it was subsequentlyimproved, and when the TokaidoShinkansen started operations in 1964,MARS 101, a full-scale system includingautomated ticketing, was put online.Continuous improvements yieldedincreasingly better performance and whenJNR was split up and privatized in 1987,the Railway Information Systems Co., Ltd.(JR Systems) took over operation andmanagement of the system. The latest seatreservation system consists of MARSterminals and the central computer roomissuing 1.5 million reserved and open-seating tickets each day. It also handleshotel reservations and tickets for a widevariety of events, and allows payment bycredit card. The man-machine interfaceusing touch screens was designed to allowoperators to conduct many complex

actions quickly. There are also machinesin stations that can be operated directlyby passengers. JR Systems Co., Ltd. alsoallows passengers to access train ticketinformation from their home computers.

Automatic FareCollection System

In the past, tickets were issued by stationstaff from ticket windows, and tickets werechecked by a guard at the ticket barrier.Ticketing and ticket collection are nowmostly handled by machines in order toimprove efficiency and free employeesfrom this laborious task. Ticket sales wereautomated first. Currently, almost alltickets except reserved seats, long-distance tickets, and special discounttickets are sold by automatic ticketmachines. Early machines could only sellsingle-fare tickets, but they were improvedand one machine can now sell manydifferent fares. Similarly, the first machinescould only accept coins, but they can nowhandle banknotes of all denominations.When a passenger inserts money into themachine, every button for less than theinserted amount lights up. When thepassenger presses a button, the ticket isissued and change is given if the insertedmoney exceeded the fare. However,

MARS central computer room (JR Systems) CyberStation home page providing ticketing information (JR Systems)


Technology


before using this type of ticket machine,the passenger must look up the cost of theticket on a fare chart. More recently, atouch-screen interface is used to reducethe burden on the passenger by allowingpassengers to choose stations rather thanmonetary amounts. The photographbelow shows this type of automatic ticketmachine, operated by JR East. There isalso a prepaid fare system that freespassengers from the need to purchasetickets. With this system, the passengerinserts a prepaid card into the automaticticket gate at boarding and the fare isdeducted automatically later when thepassenger passes through the exit gate.There are also extremely popular storedfare (SF) cards that can be used on linesof several railway companies.As mentioned earlier, in Japan, tickets arechecked at the ticket gate. Any automaticgate to take the place of human ticketcheckers must be able to handle largepassenger volumes accurately andquickly. Automatic ticket gates were firstused widely in the 1970s, mainly byprivate railways in the Kansai region. Theinformation on the ticket must bemachine-readable, so systems ofpunching holes and magnetic bar-codesystems were tried, but the final system

settled on using a magnetic coating on theback of the ticket to store information.Japanese ticket gates are set up so thatpassengers insert their tickets whilewalking through the barrier. When thepassenger inserts a ticket on the near side,a belt carries it through the machine tothe point where the information is read.After determining the ticket validity, themachine writes necessary information onthe ticket, and if the passenger requiresthe ticket for further parts of the journey,another belt carries it to the far side of thebarrier to be taken by the passenger. Ifthe ticket is invalid, a barrier blocks theway, preventing the passenger frompassing. In order to speed up passagethrough the gate, two tickets can beinserted in quick succession. Themachines can also recognize and handlecommuter passes and SF cards by the sizeand information stored on them.Moreover, passengers can insert ticketseither face-up or face-down, forwards orbackwards.

Contactless IC Card System

The automatic ticket-checking systemdescribed above is a showcase of leading-edge technology, but has the followingproblems:• Before adoption of automatic ticket-

checking machines, passengers onlyneeded to show their commuterpasses to station personnel, but nowthey must remove the pass from itsholder and insert it into the machine.

• Because the passenger releases theticket and picks it up at the other sideof the ticket barrier, passengers maymistakenly take other people’s tickets.

• The high-performance machines costa lot of money and have many movingparts, making maintenance very timeconsuming.

• The tickets do not have a very highlevel of security. Since information isstored in a magnetic strip, anyone withspecialized knowledge can read (andchange) the stored information.

JR East automatic ticket vending machine (JR East) Latest magnetic automatic ticket gates (JR East)


R&D on a new automatic fare collectiontechnology—the contactless IC card—aims to resolve these problems. Thesecards have an embedded IC chip that canstore vast amounts of data. Since thesecards have their own data processingfunctions, they are also called smart cards.Ordinary IC cards have a contact that isused to transfer data, but contactless ICcards communicate with the automatict icke t -checking machine v ia anembedded antenna, obviating the need forcontact. This type of card allowspassengers to pass through the automaticticket-checking machine while holdingtheir cards. The card security is also vastlyimproved, because third parties cannoteasily read the information contained inthem. And because they can store largeamounts of information, they can moreeasily be used to begin new businessservices as well as be put to non-railwayuses.R&D mainly by RTRI and JR East on ticket-checking machines for contactless ICcards has been underway since the JRgroup was first established in 1987.Several prototype cards and ticket

checking machines have been made, andevaluated by JR East employee monitorsseveral times. The first real-life test wasin 1992 at Ueno Station. JR East went onto develop ever more successful systems,making it feasible to meet the stringentrequirements of Japanese railways. Thecompany plans to commercialize thecards in 2001. The automatic gates usedin tests can handle both magnetic ticketsand contactless IC cards. The newcontactless Super Urban Intelligent Card(Suica) combines a commuter pass and anSF card into one. When a passenger travelsoutside the section covered by thecommuter pass , the t icke t ga teautomatically calculates and deducts theexcess fare from the SF part of the card.This enables replacement of the present fareadjustment machines that must be used topurchase a separate excess fare ticket.Use of contactless IC cards will not onlymake tickets easier to use, it will alsoreduce the number of mechanical parts,making automatic ticket-checkingmachines s impler and reducingmanufacturing and maintenance costs.Although some way off in the future,

passengers will be one-day able to use asingle card to ride on trains and buses,paying fares with electronic cash. Thistype of system depends on reliability andsecurity and the contactless IC card is wellsuited to this purpose.

Barrier-free Access

Most Japanese train stations cannot beaccessed wi thout some ver t ica lmovement. This is a huge impediment topeople with physical disabilit ies.Moreover, many stations do not havesufficient room to retrofit elevators ore sca la to r s w i thou t a l t e r ing theconstruction of the building at great cost.However, awareness of the need to createa barrier-free environment has increasedrecently and subsidies from national andlocal governments have given a greatboost to station improvement. New typesof lifts have been developed for stationswhere i t would be impossible orprohibitively expensive to constructnormal elevators or escalators. The photoon p. 54 shows a lift that can be installed

Design of contactless IC card (JR East) Contactless IC card in field testing (JR East)


Technology


on stairs to carry a wheelchair up anddown. It is designed to fold away whennot in use, keeping out of the way ofpeople passing on foot. In addition, anescalator has been developed that canextend three steps horizontally flat if themode is changed, allowing wheelchairsto be carried safely.Another indispensable service forpassengers is information. Japan’s urbanrailways have a mind-boggling number oflines and fares, sometimes confusingpeople unused to the system who aretrying to figure out how much it will costto get to their destination as well as howto get there. In addition, complaints aresome t imes hea rd tha t accu ra teinformation is not given when there aredelays or other problems. Railways haveinstalled a variety of signboards andcomputerized display screens in responseto these problems, and var iousimprovements have been made, includinglinking computerized display screensdirectly to the transport managementsystem, in order to provide informationinstantaneously. And as the personal

computer makes its way increasingly intothe home and office, software is appearingthat calculates optimum routes and fares.H o w e v e r, e v e n w i t h a l l t h e s eimprovements, information services arestill far from perfect.Until now, all railway information wasonly announced or displayed on screens;passengers have to listen to or view allth is in format ion, and se lect theinformation relevant to them. This typeof system makes it nearly impossible toprovide the kind of attentive service thatwill gain passenger satisfaction. The bestchoice would probably be to giveeveryone individualized guidance, but itis not possible for station employees toattend to every passenger individually.We feel it is necessary to developmachines and computer systems that giveind iv idua l ized gu idance wi th aconversational interface, even though theymay not function as well as a person. Aguide system for visually impaired peopleis currently being developed by RTRI(Figure 1). Since information is oftenpresented visually, people with impaired

vision often have a difficult time gettinginformation. With this system, IC chipsprogrammed with location informationare embedded in tactile tiles used to markpaths for visually impaired people; thisinformation is read by a cane with anembedded antenna, and verbal directionsare given by a pocket-sized portablemachine. For instance, if the user tellsthe device ‘I want to take a train to Tokyo’,the machine will guide him or her to theright platform by voice instructions. Themachine can also be used to inform theperson of their present location. We arealso looking into equipping the machinewith a wireless device that can pick upinformation from trains and tell the userwhether to get on a particular train arrivingat the platform. We plan to continue ourresearch in order to extend this service toprovide personalized information topeople with other disabilities, and toordinary passengers as well.A holistic approach to a barrier-freeenvironment is universal design—in thisconcept, barrier-free does not meanproviding facilities for specific types of

Latest computerized timetable display screens (JR East)Stair wheelchair lift (JR East)


people, but instead aims to design stationsthat are easy to use for everyone. Japanesetrain stations still have a lot of constructionand environment issues, but I think weare making rapid improvements in theseareas.

Conclusion

This paper has outlined passenger servicetechnologies on Japanese railways. Theseservices are closely intertwined with newinformation technologies, and thebreakneck pace of change will transformrailway passenger services in many ways.Japan’s railway engineers are working tocontribute to society by making railwayseven more passenger-friendly. �

Figure 1 Guide System for Visually Impaired Persons

Voice

Radio

Tag

Audioinformation

Voicerecognition

Voicesynthesis

Processor

User information

Receiver

TransmitterTag readerCane

Information on roads,traffic signals, etc.

Road

Tag

Information on train, seats, destination, etc.

Train

Tag

Information on platforms, aisles, etc.

Station

Guide system for visually impaired persons (RTRI)

Kanji WakoMr Kanji Wako is Director in charge of Research and Development at the Railway Technical Research Institute (RTRI). He

joined JNR in 1961 after graduating in engineering from Tohoku University. He is the supervising editor for this series on

Railway Technology Today.

Koichi Goto

Mr Goto is Senior Engineer in the Transport Systems Development Division of RTRI. He Joined JNR

in 1980 after obtaining a Masters Degree in Information Science from Kyoto University. He co-authored

Railways and Computers (in Japanese), published by Kyoritsu in 1998.

(RTRI)

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