A marvelous website, "Ekikara," allows you to look up timetables for any train station in Japan: http://www.ekikara.jp/top.htm
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Example: this is the listing of weekday inbound departure times for Machida Station on the Odakyu Line. Geographically speaking, this is "commuter rail" in American terms. The station has four tracks, but is on a two-track segment of the Odakyu Line.pic.twitter.com/ZUIpi4NNvb
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Machida is about as far away from Shinjuku as Framingham is from Boston. The Odakyu Line continues beyond Machida to Enoshima and Hakone, which are about as far from Tokyo as Haverhill and Gardner, respectively, are from Boston.
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Crucially, the Odakyu Line has multiple levels of service (eg local, rapid, express), nearly all of which stop at Machida. If you're at a less important stop, many of the higher level trains will skip you--compare prev timetable with this one from Tsurukawa (also weekday inbound)pic.twitter.com/wwWpENyyMM
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Much lower frequency...but still very good! Trains every ten minutes or better for most hours of service. Both Machida and Tsurukawa Stations are in the city of Machida, which has a lower population density than Somerville, MA (15.5k/sqmi vs 18k/sqmi)
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Somerville has three commuter rail (well, four, but barely) and two subway lines running through it...but only two train stations, one for each of the subway lines. It's widely accepted as a missed opportunity, and MBTA is working to extend another subway line through the city...
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...but why would you need a subway line to provide high frequency? The line will just use a commuter rail alignment in the first place--those ROWs are a crucial asset, and should be upgraded to operate modern EMUs at high frequencies, subway or no! So many would-be passengers!
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Already, much of the commuter rail network is being upgraded with double-tracking, high platform stations, etc...already, there are commuter rail stations in dozens of cities and towns throughout the Greater Boston area...there is tremendous potential here!
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As bustling as the Greater Tokyo area is, there is no serious proposal that I'm aware of to extend a subway line all the way to Machida. But why would there need to be? The commuter line provides an identical level of service already! This must be MBTA policy too
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