JR West announced they have built and will start to use a new moving safety fence on Shinkansen track 2 (eastbound) in Shin-Kobe Station from August 27. The new fence opens up to about 5.5 m to be good for both 16-car trains and 8-car ones.
To support for reconstruction of the flood-stricken district, JR West will sell a discount ticket again. This ticket “Kodama Gentei Jiyuseki Katamichi Ticket” (こだま限定自由席片道きっぷ) makes participants in volunteer activities easy to take Shinkansen for their returning travels. Therefore, this is available only in one direction from the activity area to Shin-Osaka.
In Chugoku area, the transport facilities have been heavily damaged over large areas from the heavy rain in July. Sanyo Shinkansen trains run as scheduled now but some local train services are still suspended. JR West announced they will provide additional Kodama service from Hiroshima to Higashi-Hiroshima.
In August, this site Shinkansen Timetable had been visited 190 thousand times by 147 thousand users, and the page view was 518 thousand. The 25.2% in the total access was through desktop, 69.2% through mobile, 5.6% through tablet.
According to JR Central, the train congestion peaks during coming summer holiday period (August 9, 2018 – August 19) will be August 15 for inbound trains. The following data are from this site Shinkansen Timetable’s independent survey. The seat availability changes from moment to moment, but they may be of some help to find remained seats.
