Heavy year-end holiday traffic

Domestic flights and bullet trains from Tokyo are crowded on Thursday as travelers head to their hometowns and resorts for the New Year holiday period. Flights from Tokyo to Osaka and elsewhere are almost fully booked throughout the day. Passengers formed long lines at check-in counters at Tokyo’s Haneda Airport. Train operators say reserved seats on many Shinkansen services from Tokyo are fully booked from the early morning until evening. They say the occupancy rates for non-reserved seats exceed 100 percent on some trains. A Shinkansen line linking Tokyo and the northernmost prefecture of Hokkaido opened in March of this year. A father of 2 said he found the new line very convenient. The Japan Road Traffic Information Center says vehicles are backed up for about 20 kilometers in some sections of expressways. The expressway congestion is expected to peak on Friday. Source and image: NHK Share this:TweetEmail

December 29, 2016

Domestic flights and bullet trains from Tokyo are crowded on Thursday as travelers head to their hometowns and resorts for the New Year holiday period.

Flights from Tokyo to Osaka and elsewhere are almost fully booked throughout the day. Passengers formed long lines at check-in counters at Tokyo’s Haneda Airport.

Train operators say reserved seats on many Shinkansen services from Tokyo are fully booked from the early morning until evening. They say the occupancy rates for non-reserved seats exceed 100 percent on some trains.

A Shinkansen line linking Tokyo and the northernmost prefecture of Hokkaido opened in March of this year. A father of 2 said he found the new line very convenient.

The Japan Road Traffic Information Center says vehicles are backed up for about 20 kilometers in some sections of expressways.

The expressway congestion is expected to peak on Friday.