In recent years, with the completion of the new Shinkansen lines in sight, some are expressing expectations for the construction of a basic plan that covers a significant portion of conventional trunk line railways. But, starting new construction poses a major problem in terms of financial resources. There are various issues in development of trunk railways, including Shinkansen construction, and various factors are intricately intertwined. Therefore, in this paper, various issues in trunk railway development are presented, their interrelationships from the perspective of returning development profits are analyzed, and solutions of the major issues are proposed. As a result, the following proposals are presented: (a) Collection of “root benefits” or transportation tax is not appropriate because they are changed form of user burden. (b) Since the areas along the Shinkansen from the JNR era to the present have not enough returned development profits to the rail line, a portion of the tax revenue along the lines will be used as a financial source. (c) Since there are unjust burdens depending on the time of year, a system is needed to equalize these burdens. (d) By being involved in freight transportation, aviation, regional transportation, etc., there is a possibility of raising funds for trunk railway development based on the perspective of a comprehensive transportation system. (e) Facilitate the application of interim Shinkansen development program as a means of improving conventional lines. (f) Change the method of calculating the burden along the line to be proportional to the number of stations installed, rather than the construction length. (g) With reference to the theoretical framework of the land readjustment project, the government will issue currency (equivalent to a reduction in foot traffic) to develop trunk railways (equivalent to the provision of land for public works), and the value of the national land will increase (generation of development profits) in an integrated manner. Possibilities of such a system design. Note that this research focuses on analyzing the structure of the mainline railway development issues, and verification of the feasibility of each plan is a future topic.
View full abstract