4 ms·

>Again, this still doesn't feel like the Shinkansen needs to time departures to the second any more than other busy railway lines do. Apart from that their repu

>Again, this still doesn't feel like the Shinkansen needs to time departures to the second any more than other busy railway lines do. Apart from that their reputation is that they do? I'm sure reputation and culture plays a huge part in this, but as I said I don't know the specifics of their operation so I can only speculate. When you have multiple lines with many trains serving the same station, the number of platforms you have available at a given time becomes a problem. Also, a train being a few seconds early might cause another train to wait at a switch. There is also the problem with transfers. In Europe, when taking international trains, they take no responsibility if you miss your train because of a delay, unlike airlines. This makes it a huge pain to go to another non-neighboring country by train. I'm aware that this is not an issue of "seconds" but rather minutes or sometimes hours, but imagine missing an appointment by just a few seconds. If your transit is punctual, all the responsibility is yours.

logifail 4y ago
> In Europe, when taking international trains, they take no responsibility if you miss your train because of a delay, unlike airlines Source? If you are ticketed across one or more European borders I believe the train operating companies will take some responsibility, at least in terms of allowing alternative trains without a new ticket. This summer I travelled with my daughter from Paris to Austria, changing in both Mannheim and Munich, and we misconnected in Mannheim and had to take an alternative to our booked train to Munich, and an alternative train from Munich to Kufstein. We were on a "booked trains only" (completely inflexible) ticket, but in both cases a quick conversation with the train staff and having the DB app showing the hugely delayed (booked) train was all that was required.
- lmm 4y ago
  There's an association of train operators that guarantee that they'll honour your ticket if you miss a connection because of a delay on another one of them, but it's all voluntary rather than having a legal guarantee like you do with flights, and not every European operator is signed up.
  - Symbiote 4y ago
    It's not voluntary at all, it's required by the internation convention concerning the carriage of passengers and luggage by rail: https://treaties.un.org/doc/Publication/UNTS/Volume%201101/volume-1101-I-16898-English.pdf https://treaties.un.org/doc/Publication/UNTS/Volume%201101/v... https://help.raileurope.co.uk/article/41665-understanding-civ https://help.raileurope.co.uk/article/41665-understanding-ci...
    - lmm 4y ago
      That's only if you have a single through ticket for your whole journey, which is often not possible to buy.
      - logifail 4y ago
        > That's only if you have a single through ticket for your whole journey, which is often not possible to buy. If you don't purchase single through ticket for air travel, you aren't protected if you misconnect either!
        lmm 4y ago
        Right, but those are a lot more practically available. Most rail routes are only available on a single national operator, and there's rarely any "code sharing".

logifail 4y ago

> In Europe, when taking international trains, they take no responsibility if you miss your train because of a delay, unlike airlines Source? If you are ticketed across one or more European borders I believe the train operating companies will take some responsibility, at least in terms of allowing alternative trains without a new ticket. This summer I travelled with my daughter from Paris to Austria, changing in both Mannheim and Munich, and we misconnected in Mannheim and had to take an alternative to our booked train to Munich, and an alternative train from Munich to Kufstein. We were on a "booked trains only" (completely inflexible) ticket, but in both cases a quick conversation with the train staff and having the DB app showing the hugely delayed (booked) train was all that was required.

lmm 4y ago
There's an association of train operators that guarantee that they'll honour your ticket if you miss a connection because of a delay on another one of them, but it's all voluntary rather than having a legal guarantee like you do with flights, and not every European operator is signed up.
- Symbiote 4y ago
  It's not voluntary at all, it's required by the internation convention concerning the carriage of passengers and luggage by rail: https://treaties.un.org/doc/Publication/UNTS/Volume%201101/volume-1101-I-16898-English.pdf https://treaties.un.org/doc/Publication/UNTS/Volume%201101/v... https://help.raileurope.co.uk/article/41665-understanding-civ https://help.raileurope.co.uk/article/41665-understanding-ci...
  - lmm 4y ago
    That's only if you have a single through ticket for your whole journey, which is often not possible to buy.
    - logifail 4y ago
      > That's only if you have a single through ticket for your whole journey, which is often not possible to buy. If you don't purchase single through ticket for air travel, you aren't protected if you misconnect either!
      - lmm 4y ago
        Right, but those are a lot more practically available. Most rail routes are only available on a single national operator, and there's rarely any "code sharing".