At the moment there are only four services per day on the Sanyo Shinkansen that you can book the private compartments. The room costs four times that of a normal seat, but since it's intended to be used by four people it would pan out to be the same price. You can also use this room for cheap on the route from Hakata to Hakata Minami for just €1.9 (¥330)

the rollbar in the accessible toilet becomes extra useful in case of a derailment

Personally I like the aerodynamic design of the 700 series over the newer N700 series. The nose is not that long but it still gives a sense of smooth airflow. But it's not like the stubby 300 series. I just like the Dr. Yellow 700 series that runs up and down the Tokaido and Sanyo Shinkansen

For the 700 series _Shinkansen_ (the original one, not the newer N700(A*/S) ones) only the 1st & last rows in each car have power outlets. & I think they are also the last _Shinkansen_ to have squat toilets but no bidets/toilet seat warmers. & I guess that the multi-purpose room is a euphemism for "nursing room/sick bay" *By the way I also remember that all N700 _Shinkansen_ have been upgraded to N700A spec, with more energy efficient propulsion equipment, while some brand-new rolling stock built to N700A standard were also built in 2013

Thanks for the history lesson, very digestible - still a very usable train, despite its age - my one minus would be the toilet layout - not very sanitary to be exiting a toilet area and then entering a separate room to wash your hands, oh well . . . . \m/

Here is some bit more mention to explain about the 700 series Shinkansen you’re on. 10:02 these room are special to the 700 series RailStar sets (current Shinkansen in the video). As the 16 car versions doesn’t have these. These room and RailStar exist was JR West’s attempt to compete with air travel in Japan. These originally run the service “Hikari RailStar” it’s basically a special named hikari train. However it was because of the 8 Car N700 that goes to Kyushu have somewhat same stopping pattern as a Hikari service, meaning rendering hikari services on the Sanyo Shinkansen section completely redundant (expection to hikari trains that runs all the way to Tokyo). Which meant these 700 series were reallocated to Kodama services along with the 500 series. Some only very very occasionally at a specific time does Hikari Railstar services. 7:43 would’ve recommend you to put the 16 car versions instead as those are the first versions of the 700 series before the railstars came in. Also a little fact. All of JR west’s Shinkansen are future proof for a future 16 car to 8 car conversion. The other 8 (or so) 700 series from the B sets were modified and ran as 700 series E set aka the railstar sets.

Please do a video about the weird IC2-trains on Lollandsbanen!

Will you be doing a review on the 500 series Shinkansen?

There is another reason why the car number of the new cars will remain the same as 700. 800 is the number already used for Kyushu Shinkansen cars, and 900 is the number used for inspection cars. And since JR Tokai & JR West basically do not use car numbers over 1000 The 700 is added to the alphabet to classify the new cars. 新型車両の車両番号が700のまま変わらないのは、別の理由もあります。 800は九州新幹線の車両で既に使用されている番号で、900は検査車両などに使用される番号です。 そして、JR東海&JR西日本では、1000を超える車両番号は基本的に使用していないため 700にアルファベットを追加する方法で、新型車両の区分を行っています

Hey Simon, thanks for another great video - they're always very informative and well put together. Your English is excellent, expressions like "the crack of dawn" are not something I'd expect a non-native speaker to use. Did you live in in an English speaking country for a while?

Day 1 of asking for a IC2 video

me who calls it new osaka:

Glad the vlog was made by a non-Japanese. I would certainly be uncomfortable to watch if the vlog was made by a Japanese person. Lots of censorship to expect.