Tokyo Metro Ginza Line

The Ginza Line (銀座線, Ginza-sen^?) is a subway line located in Tokyo, Japan. It is part of the of Tokyo Metro network. The official name is Line 3 Ginza Line (3号線銀座線, 3-gōsen Ginza-sen^?). It is 14.3 km long and serves the wards of Shibuya, Minato, Chūō, Chiyoda, and Taitō.

On maps, diagrams and signboards, the line is shown using the color orange, and its stations are given numbers using the letter G.

History

The Ginza Line began as the brainchild of a businessman named Noritsugu Hayakawa (早川徳次^?), who visited London in 1914, saw the London Underground and concluded that Tokyo needed its own underground railway. He founded the Tokyo Underground Railway (東京地下鉄道, Tōkyō Chika Tetsudō^?) in 1920, and began construction in 1925.

The portion between Ueno and Asakusa was completed on December 30, 1927 and publicized as "the first underground railway in the Orient." Upon its opening, the line was so popular that passengers often had to wait more than two hours to ride a train for a five-minute trip.

On January 1, 1930, the subway was extended by 1.7 km to temporary Manseibashi Station, abandoned on November 21, 1931 when the subway reached Kanda, 500 meters further down south the line. The Great Depression slowed down construction, but the line finally reached its originally planned terminus of Shinbashi on June 21, 1934.

In 1938, the Tōkyō Rapid Railway (東京高速鉄道, Tōkyō Kōsoku Tetsudō^?), a company tied to the predecessor of today's Tokyu Corporation, began service between Shibuya and Toranomon, later extended to Shinbashi in 1939. The two lines began through-service interoperation in 1939 and were formally merged as the Teito Rapid Transit Authority ("Eidan Subway" or "TRTA") in July 1941.

The "Ginza Line" name was applied in 1953 to distinguish the line from the new Marunouchi Line. In the postwar economic boom, the Ginza Line became increasingly crowded. The new Hanzōmon Line began to relieve the Ginza Line's traffic in the 1980s, but the Ginza Line is still quite crowded as it serves major residential, commercial, and business districts in central Tokyo. According to a June 2009 Tokyo Metropolitan Bureau of Transportation survey, the Ginza Line is the seventh most crowded subway line in Tokyo, running at 168% capacity between Akasaka-Mitsuke and Tameike-Sannō stations.^[1]

The newest station on the line, Tameike-Sannō Station, opened in 1997 to provide a connection to the newly-built Namboku Line.

Rolling stock

The Ginza Line uses a total of 38 six-car 01 series EMUs which have a maximum speed of 80 km/h. Each car is 16 m long and 2.6 m wide, with three doors on each side. Both the Ginza Line and the Marunouchi Line run on standard gauge (1,435 mm) rails powered by a 600 V DC third rail, while the other Tokyo Metro lines run on narrow gauge (1,067 mm) rails and use 1,500 V DC overhead.

New 1000 series EMUs are scheduled to be introduced on the line from spring 2012.^[2]

Cars are stored and inspected at the Ueno Inspection Division (上野検車区, Ueno-kensha-ku^?), a facility located northeast of Ueno Station with both above-ground and underground tracks. The facility is capable of holding up to 20 6-car formations. Major inspections are carried out at Tokyo Metro's Nakano depot on the Marunouchi Line, forwarding over a connecting track at Akasaka-Mitsuke.

Former rolling stock

• 100 series (1938–1968)
• 1000 series (1927–1968)
• 1100 series (1930–1968)
• 1200 series (1934–1986)
• 1300 series (1949–1986)
• 1400 series (1953–1985)
• 1500 series (1954–1986)
• 1500N series (1968–1993)
• 1600 series (1955–1986)
• 1700 series (1956–1986)
• 1800 series (1958–1986)
• 1900 series (1958–1987)
• 2000 series (1958–1993)

Operation

Almost all Ginza Line trains operate on the line's full length from Asakusa to Shibuya. However, two trains depart in the early morning from Toranomon, and some late-night trains from Shibuya are taken out of service at Ueno.

On weekdays, trains run every two minutes in the morning peak, every 2 minutes and 15 seconds in the evening peak, and every 3 minutes during the daytime. The first trains start from Shibuya and Asakusa at 05:01, and the last ones reach Shibuya at 00:37, and Asakusa at 00:39.

Station list

Being the oldest line on the Tokyo Metro, stations are also the closest to the surface—generally no more than one and a half stories underground. The western end of the line emerges to the surface and enters Shibuya Station located on the third-floor of a building that is located in a depression.

References

External links

• Ginza Line overview (Tokyo Metro) (Japanese)