Check out which ones so you can get the temperature that’s right for you.

Summer is certainly no joke in Japan. The building I live in was given a proclamation by the local government all but ordering everyone inside to use their air conditioners, the reason being that in the previous year, ambulances were dispatched there dozens of times to treat people for heatstroke and it was a drain on emergency resources.

It just goes to show though that even in the hottest of days, there are people who are adverse to conditioned air, either because they feel the cost is too high or because they feel it can also have negative effects on health.

▼ And then there are some who just can’t figure out the remote.

That’s why JR West and JR Central are teaming up to test-run some Shinkansen cars with weak air conditioning during August. The railway operators say that past surveys have indicated a “certain demand” for weakly air-conditioned cars so they intend to put that to the test for a limited time.

Some other train lines already offer weak air-conditioning cars and in light of the Shinkansen news, Yahoo! Japan held a poll asking what people thought of them. An overwhelming 81.3 percent found them “quite hot” while a further 6.3 percent considered them “a little hot.” On the other hand, a not insignificant 8.8 percent of respondents felt they were “just right” and there was even 1.7 percent that considered them “a little cold” while a surprising 1.2 percent went as far as calling a weakly air-conditioned train car “quite cold.”

So, that impromptu survey would suggest that about one in 10 people would prefer a train car with less air conditioning. In fact, even in this rather randomly curated group of online comments below, two out of 11 were in support of warmer train cars, supporting the results of the poll and JR’s findings.

“First they make several restrooms women-only, and now this?”
“If it’s too cold you can put something on, but if it’s too hot there’s nothing you can do.”
“Foreigners usually have higher body temperatures too, so they won’t like this.”
“I get that everyone has their own sense of comfort but we shouldn’t have to turn up the heat of a shared space to accommodate a few people.”
“I like weak air conditioners, but recently it’s just too hot for that.”
“I don’t really like the cold, but it’s still better to feel a little chilly than to get heatstroke.”
“This smells like cutting costs in the name of meeting customer needs.”
“I don’t even want to imagine the smell in those cars.”
“If those people can get weak air-conditioning I want a car with air conditioning so strong you can see your own breath for people like me.”
“I’ve been on some trains where the air-conditioning chills me to the bone, so I think there is a demand for less intense coolers.”
“People who aren’t weak against the cold can’t understand how it feels. Especially while sitting still for a long time, I can feel sick for how cold it gets and have to walk up and down the aisle to warm up.”

Despite there being an apparent demand of one in 10 passengers wanting weakly air-conditioned cars, JR West and JR East will only be making one in 16 cars on 10 bullet trains with thermostats set just two degrees higher than the other 15. These cars will also be non-reservation so passengers can freely move to or from them.

If you are planning to travel by Shinkansen during the periods of 1 to 7 August and 18 to 31 August, the following trains on the Tokaido and Sanyo lines will feature weak air-conditioning in Car No. 3 so you can know which ones to avoid or seek out depending on your preference.

Hikari 507 from Tokyo at 10:03 a.m. to Okayama
Hikari 509 from Tokyo at 11:03 a.m. to Okayama
Hikari 511 from Tokyo at 12:03 p.m. to Okayama
Hikari 531 from Nagoya at 6:36 a.m. to Hakata
Hikari 535 from Nagoya at 7:37 a.m. to Hiroshima
Hikari 591 from Shin-Osaka at 6:06 a.m. to Hakata
Hikari 518 from Okayama at 4:36 p.m. to Tokyo
Hikari 520 from Okayama at 5:36 p.m. to Tokyo
Hikari 522 from Okayama at 6:36 p.m. to Tokyo
Hikari 592 from Hakata at 8:52 p.m. to Shin-Osaka

Feel free to check out these cars with reduced air-conditioning if that’s your thing. You certainly won’t catch me on one though. I’d climb into a fridge on the train if they’d let me.

Source: FNN Online Prime, Yahoo! Japan News
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