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I first came to Japan in 1986, and I lived in Tokyo for 18 years. I remember when I first went to Tokyo, my first impression was that there were “few” people. Tokyo had a population of more than 10 million at the time, which was more than Beijing’s population, and its industry was developed, making it the world’s largest industrial city. I imagine that Tokyo will be as crowded as Beijing. So where are people going? I remember that when I went shopping at Xidan Mall in Beijing, there were crowds of people on the road, and the shops were crowded and bustling. People line up in front of many counters, vying for merchandise. At first, people didn’t understand the reason for this phenomenon, but later learned that because there was no convenient transportation system in Beijing, and second, there were not enough shops, it caused this kind of overcrowding. In the huge and convenient transportation system formed by Tokyo JR Railway and other private railways, there are large and medium-sized department stores and supermarkets in every major station, especially in places with more residents. This can effectively avoid the “spectacle” that happened in Beijing Xidan Shopping Center that year. Therefore, people in Tokyo are not “few”, but the flow of people is constantly being efficiently transported and dispersed by the convenient transportation network.
It is the organic combination of this huge railway passenger transportation system and the large and medium-sized shops scattered in various stations that have formed a situation where the passenger flow is huge, but the commuting and shopping are in order. Decades ago, when traveling on a train in Japan, as in most places in China, you used cash to buy a one-time ticket or a monthly ticket with a monthly fee. And 20 years ago, when the author first came to Japan, all the train tickets used in Japan were made of magnetic materials to record the station name, face value, etc. This kind of magnetic card-type monthly pass can not only be used to judge the payment status by the automatic ticket checking machine when entering and leaving the station, but also can be purchased at the automatic ticket vending machine of each station. This not only saves a lot of manpower on the railway, but also achieves a more accurate effect than manual ticket checking. There is also a fixed consumption magnetic card. For example, after a passenger purchases a 2,000 yen magnetic card, when entering and leaving the station, the name of the station entering and leaving the station, the amount of money spent on this trip, and the remaining amount (remaining amount) are automatically obtained when entering and leaving the station. Printed on the magnetic card, so that passengers know the consumption situation well.
In recent years, with the JR East Railway as a pioneer, RFID technology has been adopted for commuter passes, and Suica is currently being promoted as a commuter pass. Perhaps the most concerned about Japanese technology and the fastest response are South Korea and Taiwan. Taiwan translates Suica as a “watermelon” card. Suica is only pronounced the same as “Watermelon” in Japanese, but it has nothing to do with watermelon. Suica is composed of the first letters of the words of “Super Urban Intelligent Card”, which is literally translated as “Super Urban Intelligent Card”. At the same time, the words pronounced as SUISUI in Japanese have the meanings of “unblocked” and “quick”, so if we translate it in a sense, we might as well translate it into “convenient card” to make it more accurate and clear.
Anyone who knows something about RFID can easily imagine how the convenience card works. It realizes billing by exchanging information and storing data between the RFID tag packaged in the card and the FRFID reader set in the self-service ticket gate at the entrance and exit of the station. At the same time, it also uses the RFID tag in the card to exchange information and recharge with the reader/writer in the automatic ticket vending machine to make the Suica portable card always maintain the amount available for consumption. The benefits of using RFID in this pricing system are at least as follows:
1. The data transmission between the card and the reader is non-contact, so that the cardholder can use it conveniently, and the reader does not have the problem of easy contamination and wear of the magnetic head like the magnetic card reader.
2. RFID itself is supported by the network, so it is easy to realize data networking and query.
3. It is easy to develop higher value-added service business.
4. The card can be used repeatedly, and its lifespan is almost infinite, so the use cost is relatively low, and it is easy to be accepted by both the issuer and the passenger of the commuter pass.
For the first time, my country’s Guangzhou Metro has introduced an RFID system for pricing and charging. In Singapore, RFID technology was used for billing in the 1990s before the advent of portable cards in Japan. Last year, my country’s Shanghai and Beijing subways successively introduced RFID toll collection systems. Thanks to the active promotion and guidance of the Shanghai Municipal Government, the “all-in-one card” for RFID pricing and charging has quickly been popularized. Not only the subway passes, but also buses and taxis can use this card for charging.
However, as far as I know, Japan’s portable card Suica is the most advanced in the transportation systems of many countries and cities. We can list some distinctive features of portable cards:
1. Fully realized unmanned ticket sales and recharge.
2. In addition to being used as a ticket, it can also be used as other means of payment, and now more and more shops are allowed to pay with portable cards. At the beginning, it was only available in some franchised shops in or near JR stations, but now It has been expanded to “College Student Collaboration” convenience stores and many restaurants all over various universities, and there is a trend to continue to spread greatly.
3. The use list can be printed out on the automatic ticket vending machine, which includes the entrance and exit station name, time, amount and other consumption details of each consumption station. The usage details of the convenience card are shown in the “Convenience Card Usage List”.
4. When passengers need an invoice, they can print the invoice on the automatic ticket vending machine.
5. The portable card used to replace the card containing the RFID tag in the commuter pass, and now the function of the portable card is shifting to the mobile phone. Since there is almost one mobile phone in Japan, Suica is closer to people’s living habits, making car consumption more portable, fast, and user-friendly.
In my country, RFID technology has begun to be applied in the transportation industry. The following Japanese experiences are worth learning from:
1. The technical starting point is higher, such as automatic ticket sales and recharge, printing consumption records, and automatic invoice issuance.
2. It can also be used for other kinds of consumption besides traveling by car.
3. Incorporate tickets and other consumer functions into mobile phones.
4. Not only for transportation in the city, but also for ticket sales in the railway system across the country can realize the FRID payment method. In this way, we no longer have to line up in front of the ticket window. The “ticket sellers” have no market and will eventually disappear.
The positive impact that Suica technology brings to people’s lives is far more than just improving work efficiency and portability. In addition, it has also played a huge role in the following aspects:
1. Security: User payments are made in an unmanned self-service environment, which improves the security of payment.
2. Environmental protection: In a big city with heavy traffic, the tickets used every day must be between several tons and tens of tons. This electronic ticket method can greatly reduce the consumption of paper materials and avoid the behavior of throwing tickets everywhere.
3. Social stability: Putting an end to rampant behaviors such as fraud by ticket dealers is conducive to the stability of social order.
Therefore, the author suggests that if you want to improve electronic information in the transportation field in a certain city, you might as well set a higher starting point and leave more room for development. The national conditions of our country are different from those of Japan. In Japan, the technology is updated very quickly. The reason why they can quickly update the technology is that the fees are high, and therefore the added value is high, and the equipment investment is easily recovered from the profit. In our country, once the equipment is introduced, it is difficult to have enough funds to eliminate and update, so since we are investing in technological transformation, we might as well stand taller, see farther, and adopt more advanced technology. For example, the author once saw a bus navigation display system in Japan. Simply put, passengers waiting at a certain bus station can see the current operating position of the bus they want to take, the waiting time they need, etc. on the display board. Just like waiting for an elevator at some elevator entrances, you can know where the elevator is through the digital display that shows the elevator location, even though the elevator does not use RFID technology. Unfortunately, even in Japan, this kind of bus navigation system that makes passengers feel very convenient is rare. If we want to transform the bus operating charging system, we might as well observe and think about the application cases of RFID, and adopt some higher-end technologies to make our technological transformation more able to meet the requirements of social progress.
It is predicted that in 2008, Beijing’s subway/urban rail transportation network will become more accessible. If designers adopt a system similar to or more advanced than the convenience card, the convenience of Beijing’s urban transportation will be self-evident. . Let us work together to realize this magnificent blueprint.
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