The Last Ginga Night Train
The last Ginga night sleeper train left Tokyo Station yesterday, ending a service that had existed since 1949. Here’s an ATV news clip showing the huge crowd of about 2,000 railway fans that assembled to take photos and video of the historic event:
Information from Wikipedia:
Ginga follows a similar route to the much faster Tōkaidō Shinkansen high-speed line, and fills the overnight gap in the Shinkansen’s timetable. While the last Osaka-Tokyo Shinkansen trains depart at 21:18 (in either direction), Ginga departs Osaka at 22:30 and Tokyo at 23:00, and arrives over an hour before the first Shinkansen arrival the next morning. This has made it somewhat popular among business travelers who need a later departure or earlier arrival than the Shinkansen can provide.
However, the numerous overnight buses on the Tokyo-Osaka route have largely captured the budget traveler market, while late evening and early morning flights to Kansai Airport (which opened in 1994 and does not have the noise restrictions facing Osaka Airport) are now used by many business travelers who would otherwise have used Ginga. As a result, Ginga’s ridership has fallen dramatically in recent years.
It was announced in December 2007 that Ginga services would cease following the March 15, 2008 timetable revision.
Update: Mainichi has since printed a story about this in English, so check it out of you want to find out more about the last Ginga express.
