[WildUtah]

tokyo has way better access to public transport than Paris.

And at half the density. The median neighborhood of the Toyko metro area is 150 while central Paris is 300 and outlying neighborhoods—not as well served by transit as Tokyo's—are over 200.

And better quality transport too.

That's largely a matter of serving Japanese passengers. In my experience, no one else matches the consistent care and respect that even young and rowdy Japanese people actively apply to public space.

[ekianjo]

> And at half the density

Density is a little bit bullshit, because density only takes in account the people living in a particular place, not the folks who actually commute every single day to work to go into offices where nobody lives.

Actually the rail network in Tokyo transports far more people than the RER/Metro in Paris, every single day.

Here: http://www.uitp.org/sites/default/files/cck-focus-papers-fil...

Tokyo is busiest rail network in the world. Paris is far, far behind.

> That's largely a matter of serving Japanese passengers

No, even the stations, the network, the trains themselves are of better quality that the ones in Paris, and have much higher passenger capacity too. Well, Paris' network is pretty old so you can't blame them for everything, but they have stopped investing heavily in transportation for a long time. The metro trains are still ancient in Paris.

[WildUtah]

Actually the rail network in Tokyo transports far more people than the RER/Metro in Paris

Tokyo's metro population is 35 million. Paris's is 11 million. Each of them is served by multiple commuter and underground subway train networks. Comparing raw passenger numbers is ridiculous.

Density is a little bit [obscenity],

Density over the built up parts of a metro area, including offices, homes, parks, industrial and commercial areas, and roadways, tells us quite a lot about the basis of transit dynamics. Paris consistently packs a lot more people in the same land area than Tokyo.

No, even the stations, the network, the trains themselves are of better quality that the ones in Paris

Paris spends enormous amount compensating for its more difficult passenger base with space, maintenance, security, cleaning personnel, and more. That doesn't even begin to address the different demands for municipal investment and corruption in governance. Many collective projects that succeed in Japan could never do so in nations where citizens are less committed to cooperation.