We can say that being efficient and well-organized are the most famous traits of Japan. You may find so as soon as you arrive at the airport in Japan, or when you walk around the streets and so on. But more than anything, the train and subway systems here would be the one that most impresses you during your trip, especially in busy Tokyo.

There are more than 60 lines running in Tokyo like cobwebs and, unbelievably enough, they hardly run behind schedule. During the morning busy hours some of the lines run every 2-3 minutes and they are still absolutely punctual, even a 280km/h Shinkansen bullet train! If the service will be delayed for 1 minute, you will hear the apology announcement from the station staff – yes, for a 1 minute delay!

Major services are: JR lines, Toei lines (subways), Metro lines (subways), Tokyu lines and Seibu lines.

Buying a ticket for local train/subway is easy. You buy a ticket per amount, not per destination. For example, if you go from station A to station B and the ticket costs 200 yen, you a buy 200 yen ticket. If station A to station C is also 200 yen, you can change your mind and go to station C instead of station B without any problem. If you are not sure how much the ticket is, you can just buy the cheapest ticket to get on and pay the extra amount later by using the wonderful fare adjustment machine which is usually installed by a station’s exit.

Once you insert the ticket into the machine, it tells you how much more you need to pay in order to get off at that particular station. Therefore you never have to worry about holding a wrong ticket or fare evasion. You can switch the display language to English too.

Alternatively, you can also use the touch-and-go prepaid card Suica or Pasmo. You need to pay a refundable deposit of 500 yen to obtain a card. However, you can recharge anytime you want (such as 1,000 yen, 3,000 yen, 5,000 yen) and you won’t have to worry about the fare all the time. If you are planning to travel a lot on trains and subways during your stay, this could be the perfect way.

Lastly, we better mention the mobile phone etiquette on trains. In Japan, you are required to put your mobile phone onto silent mode and you are not supposed to talk on the phone inside the train because the ring tone or, worse still, your conversation can be annoying to other passengers (Yes, thank you!). You are also to turn off your mobile phone around priority seats (due to possible impact to the passenger with a cardiac pacemaker).

Happy traveling everyone!