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The story
A post that checked the train timetable based on the assumption “Nagoya’s a car-dependent city, so trains must run infrequently” became a hot topic on 5ch. In reality, Nagoya’s subway network — led by the Higashiyama Line — turns out to be quite well developed, undermining the simple idea that a car-centric city automatically means sparse trains. The thread saw detailed comparisons of service frequency with other cities like Tokyo, Osaka, and Yokohama, along with discussion of stations such as Fujigaoka and Gokiso and access to Chubu Centrair International Airport, with opinions split over just how good or bad Nagoya’s transit really is.
See the source for the image
Source: x.com / Original post here
What people said
I don't know much about it, but is Gokiso supposed to be the liveliest area around there?
With a subway network this convenient, saying you can't live without a car is being way too soft
This shows Nagoya Station is actually stuck way out on the edge of the city
Nah, I'm super into this lol
It's basically the transfer point for the Linimo maglev line
Kind of like Tokyo's Hikarigaoka or Azamino
It connects to the Linimo line
The Higashiyama Line cited as the source is Nagoya's #1 subway "spiral,"
but Tokyo's Tozai Line and Osaka's Midosuji Line run about 30 trains at rush hour — more than double the Higashiyama Line.
Lmao, the subway's spinning in circles (mocking the previous poster's typo — they wrote "spiral" instead of "line")
Are you some kind of masochist who wants to ride packed trains?
Yeah, true
The Meijo Line and others aren't all that frequent either
Yeah, the places that actually get flood damage are more like Mie and Gifu — you don't hear about it much in Nagoya
Though I don't live a life where checking the timetable is even a problem in the first place
The Blue Line runs once every 10 minutes during the day
Rush-hour Blue Line = daytime Higashiyama Line
Well, the cities are different sizes so that's to be expected
Yokohama's doing its best too
"City center" lol
Like, an AEON mall or something? lol (AEON — a big-box shopping mall chain)
Do you really want to turn the area right outside your house into a tourist spot?
If you want sightseeing, you drive out of the prefecture
That's how Nagoya people do it
They're managing well even without JR
The Aichi Loop Line is basically JR in practice
Probably someone from Chiba, losing it comparing flooding to Nagoya
isn't it weird that you can't get to Chubu Centrair International Airport by train?
Roads can get delayed however much from traffic jams,
so it's way too inconvenient
Worst case you miss your flight
You can get there by train, what are you talking about
You're clearly not actually from a neighboring prefecture
Even people from nearby prefectures know Nagoya's Meitetsu line is well developed
And the highway to Chubu Centrair doesn't even get congested, you know?
You'd die if a Nankai Trough quake or a huge tsunami hit though…
Except since it's sandwiched between Tokyo and Osaka, nobody really bothers to go all the way to Nagoya
Background and Key Points of This Discussion
Nagoya’s public transit is often described as having “few trains because it’s a car-dependent city,” but what sparked this discussion was the actual timetable, centered on the subway’s Higashiyama Line. In the thread, some posts compared rush-hour frequency with Tokyo’s Tozai Line and Osaka’s Midosuji Line, pointing out that in absolute terms Nagoya doesn’t match the major lines of the biggest cities. On the other hand, many comments highlighted ways the Nagoya area’s rail network is actually quite developed — the connection between Fujigaoka and the Linimo maglev line, and the state of the Aichi Loop Railway, for example. The debate moved away from a simple “more or less” binary and toward how to evaluate differences in city scale and the role each line plays. What readers can easily get wrong is that the common image of “Nagoya equals car society” doesn’t necessarily match the actual state of its subway development — and this thread put that assumption to the test using the hard data of a timetable.
※This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Nanademo Jikkyou G) thread “[Image] Me: “Nagoya? It’s car country so trains must be infrequent” → I checked the timetable and…“.

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