Amid the debate around the pros and cons of the proposed UK’s High Speed 2 rail project, Dr Christopher Hood of Cardiff University has an article in the Social Science Japan Journal on ‘The Shinkansen’s Local Impact’, which assesses the effect high speed rail has had on local areas in Japan. The article “look[s] at these various changes, both positive and negative, and consider what impact the future development of the shinkansen network is likely to have. It looks at the cases of the Hokuriku Shinkansen and Kyūshū Shinkansen in detail, comparing them with those lines that opened prior to the privatization of Japanese National Railways in 1987. The article considers what has happened in various cities, towns and villages which have both gained and lost thanks to the continued expansion of the shinkansen network.”
Dr Hood is the author of Shinkansen: From Bullet Train to Symbol of Modern Japan (Palgrave).
