[HN Gopher] Illustrations of 'Unseen' Japanese Maintenance Train...
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       Illustrations of 'Unseen' Japanese Maintenance Trains That Only
       Work at Night
        
       Author : zdw
       Score  : 30 points
       Date   : 2023-04-06 21:39 UTC (1 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.spoon-tamago.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.spoon-tamago.com)
        
       | poidos wrote:
       | Down for me. Archive link:
       | https://web.archive.org/web/20230406214102/https://www.spoon...
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | freetime2 wrote:
       | I was expecting this to be about "Doctor Yellow", an iconic test
       | train used to maintain the Shinkansen lines.
       | 
       | https://www.tokyoweekender.com/art_and_culture/japanese-cult...
        
       | inasio wrote:
       | Spoon and Tamago is probably the newsletter I've been subscribed
       | to the longest, every single (infrequent) email is beautifully
       | crafted with very nice content, highly recommend.
        
       | VyseofArcadia wrote:
       | I wish we could just do maintenance in the US. Here in Boston, we
       | underfunded the MBTA for a decade[0], and now the system is
       | hanging on by a thread.
       | 
       | Roads are falling apart, lighting poles are falling down, our
       | natural gas infrastructure is leaking like crazy. Why can't we
       | just take care of our stuff?
       | 
       | [0] To pay for more car stuff which ended up being a boondoggle
       | in its own right, of course
       | https://www.cbsnews.com/boston/news/i-team-big-dig-root-mbta...
        
         | jacobsenscott wrote:
         | You can't privatize competently maintained infrastructure.
        
           | _dain_ wrote:
           | most japanese railways are privately owned and operated and
           | maintained, and turn a healthy profit
        
       | qiqitori wrote:
       | "Japanese trains are renowned for their [...] comfort"
       | 
       | Yes, who doesn't love being packed into a tin can with some
       | fellow sardines?
        
         | freetime2 wrote:
         | You have a point - I find riding a train during Tokyo rush hour
         | to be quite miserable. But not everywhere is as crowded as
         | Tokyo, and lots of trains have reserved seating, and they are
         | very comfortable indeed.
        
       | whalesalad wrote:
       | I love the Tamiya style of illustration so much. This is awesome!
        
       | cryptoz wrote:
       | I saw a yellow maintenance train in Montreal metro once after
       | getting off the last train at night. I had a digital camera with
       | me (2006 or so) and I started to take pictures but I was
       | immediately chased away my multiple (several) very angry
       | employees shouting at me in French. I couldn't believe that they
       | treated it with such secrecy but also ran the train through while
       | people were in the station still.
        
       | neilv wrote:
       | The illustration style reminds me of a young children's book of
       | trucks or machinery that I had.
       | 
       | IIRC, besides the normal fascination with big machines, the book
       | seemed to glorify the machines and the idealized and determined
       | workers operating them, a bit like propaganda posters from some
       | other countries.
       | 
       | I think the book I had was from Japan. (Half my family is from
       | Hawaii, and there was a lot of cultural cross-pollination as part
       | of ordinary life.)
        
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       (page generated 2023-04-06 23:00 UTC)