What comes to mind when you hear a subway? You tend to think of a dark tunnel or rarely an elevated track passing through a river and so on.
Wait a bit! I'd like you to see the top photo. You can see a railway crossing near Ueno station on the "subway" Tokyo Metro-Ginza line. It's an extra rare subway spot in Japan. Why is it there? That's a good question. This railway crossing is located on the siding track between the underground main track and Ueno Depot on the ground.
It's not easy to see a train passing through this railway crossing, because the timetable of deadhead trains to and from Ueno Depot are not made public. One day, I watched there between 4 and 5pm, and came across a train only one time. Tokyo Metro takes strict security measures at this railway crossing to ensure the safety of pedestrians. As you know, the electric system of the Ginza line is the third rail... not overhead catenary. To reduce the risk of pedestrians' electric shock, there're rugged steel gates on both sides of the railway crossing. Thanks to the steel gates, pedestrians don't get lost onto the subway track.
In the meantime, if you're interested, please have a look at my previous post in 2014. It's the other extra rare railway spot, where you can see a level intersection of a railway and a tram line in Matsuyama City. Extra rare railway spot-hopping... that's a very fun time.
