More bicycling #2: Japanese Railway bicycle tourism and bike cars

More commuter rail networks accommodate bicycles.  Usually a few bikes can be accommodated in special racking in various cars on a train.  Although the highest ridership systems have serious restrictions, either allowing very few bicycles or no bicycles during peak ridership periods.

One of the justifications for bike sharing systems is rather than take your bike on a train, the idea is that you use a bike share bike at the end of your rail trip to get to your final destination.  (When I worked in Baltimore County, I had a DC bike and a Baltimore bike--it was 8 miles to Towson from Penn Station.)

Bike tourism.  On weekends, some "commuter rail" systems like Metrolink in Southern California or the MBTA in Greater Boston have dedicated train cars for bicycles.

MBTA train car.

MBTA has two different cars, one with seats and one without, deployed on lines serving bike tourists, and regularly deployed on the Rockport/Gloucester and Cape Flyer lines. The first car they created had seats as well as space for 20+ bikes. Now they seem to have moved to a bike-only car.

Amtrak (USA) and Via Rail (Canada) on certain routes have developed better accommodations for bikes, but not dedicated cars.

Japan railroad passenger marketing includes bike tourism.  In Japan, in the face of population decline, to justify continued operation, many of the passenger railroad organizations (a mix of big national railroads organized on a regional basis, and smaller firms often receiving subsidies from local and state governments) have focused on railroad tourism initiatives to build ridership on weekends and in tourist seasons.

In the US, for the most part regional passenger rail systems don't focus much on marketing outside of the work trip when it comes to tourism, although some systems do promote train travel to and from major events including sports (football, baseball, hockey, etc.) and concerts.  Some "commuter" rail systems don't even offer weekend service.

Bike tourism in Chiba Prefecture.  NHK World's tv show, "Japan Railway Journal," recently featured a program, "Bicycle Onboard: Cycling with JR East," on bike tourism and the special B.B. Base trainset JR East (Japan Railway East) designed to serve bike tourism in the Boso Peninsula area comprising the entirety of the Chiba Prefecture.

Normally, bikes on trains in Japan have to be disassembled and carried in a special bag (called "rinkos").  B.B. Base doesn't require disassembly.  Each train is set for 99 riders and 99 bicycles.

The rail marketing section created four routes, served by various trains, leaving from Ryōgoku Station in Tokyo. 

The trains are special event trains, meaning that they don't run every weekend for every route.  Each route is served one particular weekend each month of the service period.

Ryōgoku Station is the staging point because it has a separated platform used for special events, so bicycles can be separated from masses of riders for other trains. 

JR East prepared cycling maps (in Japanese) for each route, at three distances--short (avg. 20KM), middle (avg. 40KM), and long course (avg. 60KM). (Unfortunately, they are only available online. Printed maps would be good too.)

Trains have specially designed vertical racking for bikes, changing rooms, and non slip flooring material so cyclists can walk in cleats.

One car has open space with bench seating, so people can hang out.

Most trains have a bike tour ambassador (I think funded by the tourism agency) to answer questions and discuss sites etc.

They also have a bike rental operation at Ryōgoku Station for people who don't own bikes.  (Theoretically, it'd make more sense to have rental operations at the destination, but this way people have their bikes before the start of the trip, so that they don't have to wait around after arriving in Chiba.)

One concern though on the part of some bicyclists is missing the last train, which depending on the route is somewhere between 4:30 and 5:30 pm.

It has been suggested that single bike cars be added to later trains so that people could stay longer.