The transport network in Greater Tokyo includes public and private rail and highway networks; airports for international, domestic, and general aviation; buses; motorcycle delivery services, walking, bicycling, and commercial shipping. While the nexus is in the central part of Tokyo, every part of the Greater Tokyo Area has rail or road transport services. There are also a number of ports offering sea and air transport to the general public.
Public transport within Greater Tokyo is dominated by the world's most extensive urban rail network (as of May 2014, the article Tokyo rail list lists 158 lines, 48 operators, 4,714.5 km of operational track and 2,210 stations) (although stations are recounted for each operator) of suburban trains and subways run by a variety of operators, with buses, trams, monorails, and other modes supporting the railway lines. The above figures do not include any Shinkansen services. However, because each operator manages only its own network, the system is managed as a collection of rail networks rather than a single unit. Forty million passengers (counted twice if transferring between operators) use the rail system daily (14.6 billion annually) with the subway representing 22% of that figure with 8.66 million using it daily. There are in the Tokyo area, or one for each of developed land area. Commuter rail ridership is very dense, at six million people per line mile annually, with the highest among automotive urban areas. Walking and cycling are much more common than in many cities around the globe. Private automobiles and motorcycles play a secondary role in urban transport.
Rail
Overview Statistical profile Rail is the primary mode of transport in Tokyo. Greater Tokyo has the most extensive urban railway network and the most used in the world with 40 million passengers (transfers between networks tallied twice) in the metro area daily, out of a metro population of 36 million. There are 882 interconnected rail stations in the Tokyo Metropolis, 282 of which are Subway stations,There are 0.61 commuter rail stations in the Tokyo area per square mile (one for each 1.6 square miles) of developed land area, combined with the high density connecting bus networks, Commuter rail ridership is very dense, at six million people per line mile annually, with the highest among automotive urban areas. Urban Transport Factbook, Tokyo-Yokohama Suburban Rail Summary with several hundred more in each of the three surrounding densely populated suburban prefectures. There are 30 operators running 121 passenger rail lines (102 serving Tokyo and 19 more serving Greater Tokyo but not Tokyo's city center itself), excluding about 12 cable cars.
Features Uniquely to most major cities in the world, Tokyo's railway system is not a single, unified and centrally operated network, but rather, it consists of many separately owned and operated systems with varying degrees of interconnectivity. Most lines in Tokyo are privately owned, funded, and operated, though some, like the Toei Subway and the Tokyo Metro, are supported by the Government either directly or indirectly. Each of the region's rail companies tends to display only its own maps, with key transfer points highlighted, ignoring the rest of the metro area's network.
Extensive through and express services for seamless interconnections between certain lines are a major feature of the network; the Narita-Haneda service run integrates track of six separate and independent operators. Suburban rail operations and subway lines are also very integrated. Frequent and high-capacity suburban trains from the suburbs commonly continue directly into the subway network to serve central Tokyo, often emerging on the other side of the city to serve another company's surface suburban lines, behaving like an S-bahn network. Shinjuku Station is the busiest train station in the world by passenger throughput.According to the Shinjuku Station article, the station was used by an average of 3.64 million people per day in 2007. It is registered with Guinness World Records. Tokyo's railways tend to shut down at around midnight, with stations themselves closing around 1 a.m.
Trains had historically been extremely crowded at peak travel times, with people being pushed into trains by so-called oshiya ("pushers"), which was common in the boom eras of the 1960s–1980s. Upgrades on Greater Tokyo's railways are chiefly focused on improving services and grade-separating lines.
Corporate networks Since corporations own, fund, promote, and operate their own networks, this tends to result in high fragmentation and company stations. The end user may need to pass through multiple company gates to get to their destination, racking up extra costs in the process (generally the longer the trip, the less charged per kilometer). This is in contrast to other nations where fares are calculated in a more integrated way. For tourists, transferring between multiple operators and paying several times to get to a single destination within the metro area can be quite confusing and expensive. Locals tend to patronize a particular company for a particular destination and walk/bike to and from that company's stations, avoiding the need to transfer and pay another fare to a different company that may have a station closer to the desired destination. Some private railroads also capitalize on real estate holdings and high foot traffic by operating their own retail stores at stations. For example, Odakyu Electric Railway and Keio Corporation both have department stores over their properties at Shinjuku Station.
Busiest JR stations Passengers carried in Greater Tokyo stations daily (2023):
Shinjuku Station 650,602 Ikebukuro Station 489,933 Tokyo Station 403,831 Yokohama Station 362,348 Shibuya Station 314,059 Shinagawa Station 274,221 Ōmiya Station 244,393 Shimbashi Station 219,113 Akihabara Station 211,998 Kita-Senju Station 193,748
Japan Railway
East Japan Railway Company, or JR East, is the largest passenger railway company in the world. It operates trains throughout the Greater Tokyo area (as well as the rest of northeastern Honshū).
In addition to operating some long-haul shinkansen ("bullet train") lines, JR East operates Tokyo's largest commuter railway network. This network includes the , which encircles the center of Tokyo; the between Saitama and Yokohama; the (part of the Tōhoku Main Line) to Saitama and beyond; the to western Tokyo; the , and to Chiba; and the , , and lines to Kanagawa.
Many additional lines form a network outside the center of the city, allowing inter-suburban travel. Among these are the Hachikō, Itsukaichi, , Jōetsu, Kawagoe, , Ōme, Negishi, , Sagami, , and lines. In total, JR alone operates 23 lines within the Greater Tokyo area.
JR East is also the majority shareholder in the , one of the world's most commercially successful monorail lines.
Other railway operators serving Greater Tokyo
Regional railways transport commuters from the suburbs to central Tokyo. These include several private railway networks that own and operate a total of 55 lines serving Tokyo. These same operators indirectly operate another 24 lines outside of Tokyo as well as a few tourist-oriented aerial lifts and funiculars.
(Keikyu): Operates out of Shinagawa Station to Kanagawa and Haneda Airport. Five lines. Keio Corporation: Operates out of Shinjuku Station and Shibuya Station to western Tokyo. Six lines. Keisei Electric Railway: Operates out of Keisei Ueno Station to Chiba (including Narita International Airport). Seven lines. Odakyu Electric Railway: Operates out of Shinjuku Station to Kanagawa, most notably Odawara, Enoshima, and Hakone. Three lines. Seibu Railway: Operates out of Seibu Shinjuku Station and Ikebukuro Station to western Tokyo. Thirteen lines. Tobu Railway: Operates out of Ikebukuro Station and Asakusa Station to Saitama, Gunma, and Tochigi. Twelve lines. Tokyu Corporation (Tokyu): Operates out of Shibuya Station and Meguro Station to southern Tokyo and Yokohama. Eight lines. Sagami Railway (Sotetsu): Operates out of Yokohama Station to eastern Kanagawa and operates through services to Tokyo and Saitama via the Eastern Kanagawa Rail Link to the JR and Tokyu networks. Three lines. Metropolitan Intercity Railway Company (Tsukuba Express or TX): Links Akihabara Station with Tsukuba. One line.
Some private and public carriers operate within the boundaries of Tokyo.
Tokyo Waterfront Area Rapid Transit: Operates the Rinkai Line along the Tokyo waterfront to Odaiba. : Connects central Tokyo to Haneda Airport. : People mover serving the Tokyo waterfront and Odaiba. Tama Toshi Monorail: A suburban transit line running north–south through Western Tokyo.
Subway operators
Two organizations operate the Tokyo subway network with several other operators in the metropolitan area that operate lines that can be classified as rapid transit:
Tokyo Metro (formerly Eidan): Operates Tokyo's (and Japan's) largest subway network, with nine lines. Tokyo Metropolitan Bureau of Transportation: Operates the four Toei Subway lines as well as the following: Toden Arakawa Line: Once a common sight before subways and buses came to fore, the streetcar network has shrunk to only this one route between Waseda Station and Minowabashi Station. Nippori-Toneri Liner: People mover in northeast Tokyo owned and operated by the Tokyo Metropolitan Bureau of Transportation. Ueno Zoo Monorail: Short monorail in Ueno Zoo. Yokohama Municipal Subway: Owned and operated by the Yokohama City Transportation Bureau with two lines. : A mostly underground line that acts as an extension of the Tokyo Metro Tōzai Line connecting Funabashi and Yachiyo, Chiba. : An underground line that acts as an extension of the connecting southern Saitama to Tokyo. Rinkai Line: A mostly underground line that serves Tokyo's waterfront.
Other railway operators of Greater Tokyo Railway companies that serve other parts of Greater Tokyo include:
Chiba Prefecture : Northeast Chiba Prefecture. : A short railway line in northern Chiba, operations are subcontracted to Keisei Electric Railway. Chiba Urban Monorail: Serving the city of Chiba. Disney Resort Line: A monorail that links Maihama Station and Tokyo Disney Resort. Ryutetsu: A short line railway in Nagareyama, Chiba. Yamaman Yukarigaoka Line: A people mover in Sakura, Chiba. Kanagawa Prefecture Enoshima Electric Railway (Enoden): Scenic rail line running between Kamakura and Fujisawa in southern Kanagawa. Shonan Monorail: A monorail connecting Ofuna Station to the Shonan coast. Kanazawa Seaside Line: People mover in southern Yokohama. Yokohama Minatomirai Railway (Minatomirai Line and Kodomo-no-Kuni Line): Owns two lines in Yokohama; operations are subcontracted to Tokyu Corporation. Saitama Prefecture Saitama New Urban Transit (New Shuttle): A people mover in central Saitama.
Ridership Below is the annual ridership of each major operator as of the 2017 fiscal year.Daily Average Ridership in 2017 Train Media (sourced from JR East) Retrieved March 5, 2019. Transfers between operators are not counted unless they pass through a ticketing gate (not simply a platform).
OperatorDaily ridershipAnnual ridershipEast Japan Railway Company 16,359,962 5,971,386,130 Tokyo Metro 7,422,095 2,709,064,675Tōkyū Corporation 3,171,660 1,157,655,900Toei Subway 3,128,718 1,141,982,070Tōbu Railway 2,522,067 920,554,455Odakyū Electric Railway 2,069,383 755,324,795Keio Corporation 1,851,364 675,747,860Seibu Railway 1,804,521 658,650,165Keihin Electric Railway (Keikyu) 1,316,499 480,522,135 Keisei Electric Railway 786,063 286,912,995Sagami Railway 634,899 231,738,135 Total 41,067,231 14,989,539,315
Buses and trams