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lt is hard to say that the development of transport facilities are competently
dealing with changes in socio-economic situations. Consequently, the deterioration
of transport services has become quite evident.
Even in fiscal 1973, no signs for improvement were observed in the traffic
snarl, berth waiting time at harbors and congestion at airports (Fig.
20-1)(Fig. 20-2).
The volume of transport by Japanese National Railways continued the trend
of declining or levelling-off in recent years both in the number of passengers
and in the tonnage of goods. Especially in goods transport, lagging-behind in
facility development was pointed out with respect to the enhancement of industrial
structures and the diversification of transport demands. This caused the loss
of reputation of JNR among shippers and accelerated the trend of declining volume
of goods:transported by JNR. It is necessary, therefore, to introduce further
development and expansion of transport facilities and modernization of transport,
in order to utilize fully the characteristic features of railways such as bulk
transportation and reliability. Also, construction work for the Shinkansen Project
and Transport Capacity Reinforcement Project hasp come to be delayed, due to
such reasons as the steep price rise of construction materials, the problem
of adjustment with regional societies along railway lines regarding environmental
conservation.
In the case of ports and harbors, ,the development- of facilities, such
as anehorages, breakwaters and mooring facilities cannot catch up with the increase
in the cargo volume handled at ports. Especially at ports in the bays of Tokyo,
Ise and Osaka where a great deal of cargoes converge, volumes of cargoes handled
have already reached the maximum limits of these ports. The demurrage condition
in major five ports of Japan indicates that 3,803 ships, accounting for 5.7
per cent of the total number of berthed ships, waited for berths for average
48 hours. Further, it is considered necessary to develop port facilities which
are suited to the diversification and the increase of demands such as feriy
piers and exclusive-use. container piers.
In, air transport, a curtain was raised for the "age of massive high-speed
ttansport" by active introduction of wide body jets such as B-747 and L-1011.
Compared with the progress of airplanes, however, it can hardly be said that
full development has been made for ground base facilities such as runways, airport
terminals, safety equipment and control-tower installations. The overcrowded
state in both Tokyo and Osaka Airports is constituting one of the major causes
of restrictions on air transport--together with the measure of restricting the
number of flights due to a demand for environmental conservation. Consequent
ly, it is necessary to expedite the opening of new Tokyo International Airport
I and the commencement of construction work on new Kansai International Airport,
but both these projects are greatly delayed owing to environmental problems
such as noise and to difficult negotiations for adjustment with the regional
society. (Fig.21)
The causes of the above-mentioned delays in the development of various transport
facilities are attributable to the seriousness of environmental problems, difficulties
in securing a traffic space, and a steep rise in unit prices of construe tion
(Fig. 22). It would be necessary, therefore, to promote the development
of facilities, by taking into consideration the effective utilization of the
traffic space and security of funds for equipment investment.
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