Goods are unloaded from a Tokaido Shinkansen bullet train at Tokyo Station on Friday.
2:34 PM JST, May 18, 2024
Six companies from the Japan Railway (JR) group held a fair selling agricultural products and souvenirs transported by Shinkansen bullet trains at Tokyo Station on Friday.
JR Group companies have started transporting goods via Shinkansen as the number of business travelers on the high-speed lines has not yet recovered sufficiently.
The JR companies want to stimulate new demand for their services by deepening cooperation between the group companies.
The fair featured local specialties such as Hokkaido’s garlic chives and asparagus, which were transported via the Hokkaido-Tohoku Shinkansen Line, and Mie Prefecture’s Akafukumochi sweets, which arrived on the Tokaido Shinkansen Line.
In terms of parcel transportation, the Shinkansen lines are now connected between Hokkaido and the Kyushu region, thanks to the entry of Central Japan Railway Co. (JR Tokai) to the program in April.
Partly because of the “2024 problem” – which has tightened overtime rules for truck drivers, affecting freight shipping capacity – trains are seen as another way to move packages.
