History
Steam reached Japan by sea. In 1853 the Russian envoy Yevfimy Putyatin demonstrated a working model steam locomotive at Nagasaki, and in 1854 Commodore Matthew Perry's second American expedition presented the Tokugawa shogunate with a working model that officials rode. The models made a large impression. Tanaka Hisashige, an inventor who had watched Putyatin's demonstration at Nagasaki and had a Dutch reference book to work from, completed Japan's first domestically made model steam locomotive for the Saga Domain in 1855. He later founded the firm that became Toshiba.
The first steam locomotive brought to Japan arrived in 1865, when the Scottish merchant Thomas Blake Glover ran an imported locomotive nicknamed the "Iron Duke" on a short stretch of track in the Ōura district of Nagasaki — a demonstration rather than a regular service.
A public railway followed quickly once the new Meiji government made modernisation a priority. Engineered by foreign experts led by the Briton Edmund Morel and worked by British locomotives, Japan's first railway opened on 14 October 1872 between Shimbashi in Tokyo and Yokohama, a date now marked as Railway Day. It was built to a 1,067 mm (3 ft 6 in) narrow gauge, which still defines most of the national network today.
Expansion came fast. A second line linked Osaka and Kobe in 1874 and reached Kyoto by 1877. Much of the trunk network was then laid by private companies, led by Nippon Railway, founded in 1881 as Japan's first private railway, which pushed a main line north from Ueno toward Aomori. The Tōkaidō Main Line, the spine of the country between Tokyo and Kobe, was completed in 1889, and in 1893 the Class 860 became the first steam locomotive built in Japan.
The state soon reasserted control. Under the Railway Nationalisation Act of 1906 the government bought up seventeen major private railways in 1906–07, consolidating the trunk lines into a single national system. Electric traction had already arrived: Japan's first electric railway, a streetcar line, began running in Kyoto in 1895. In 1927 Tokyo's Ginza Line opened as the first underground railway in Asia.
In 1949 the state railways were reorganised as Japanese National Railways (JNR), a public corporation. On 1 October 1964, the year Tokyo hosted the Olympics, JNR opened the Tōkaidō Shinkansen between Tokyo and Shin-Osaka — the world's first purpose-built high-speed railway, running on standard gauge at speeds no scheduled train had reached before.
Mounting debts finally broke up the national operator: in 1987 JNR was privatised and split into the seven companies of the Japan Railways (JR) Group.
Timeline
- 1853Russian envoy Putyatin demonstrates a model steam locomotive at Nagasaki.
- 1854Perry's expedition presents the shogunate with a working model locomotive.
- 1855Tanaka Hisashige builds Japan's first domestically made model steam locomotive (Saga Domain).
- 1865Thomas Glover runs the imported "Iron Duke" at Ōura, Nagasaki — the first steam locomotive brought to Japan.
- 1872Japan's first public railway opens, Shimbashi–Yokohama (14 October), British-engineered, 1,067 mm gauge.
- 1874Osaka–Kobe line opens.
- 1877The line reaches Kyoto.
- 1881Nippon Railway founded — Japan's first private railway.
- 1889Tōkaidō Main Line completed between Tokyo and Kobe.
- 1893Class 860, the first steam locomotive built in Japan.
- 1895Japan's first electric railway (streetcar) opens in Kyoto.
- 1906–07Railway Nationalisation Act: 17 private railways brought under state control.
- 1927Tokyo's Ginza Line opens — the first subway in Asia.
- 1949Japanese National Railways (JNR) established as a public corporation.
- 1964Tōkaidō Shinkansen opens (1 October) — the world's first high-speed railway.
- 1987JNR privatised and split into the seven companies of the JR Group.
- PresentRailways remain the most important means of transport in Japan's larger cities, especially for passengers.