Mini cars

Slightly random topic here. No, I'm not especially interested in cars, but have enjoyed learning more in recent months about this (possibly) unique aspect of Japanese culture. Up till this year we've owned larger cars in Japan, in fact we'd driven eight-seater vans here since 2010! If you could see the size of many roads here in Tokyo you would think that that is an act of bravery!

But now it's just the two of us we've not just downsized our living space, we've downsized our car. We now own a four-seater car of the type that is called a "Kei car". It's the smallest category of expressway-legal motor vehicles in Japan. Literally "light automobile", it's a category of car created by Japan in 1949 to stimulate (according to Wikipedia) car ownership and the growth of Japan's car industry. The government specifies the maximum dimensions of the vehicles (3.4 m long x 1.48 m wide x 2 m tall) and the the size of the engine (less than 660 cc). The engine size number doesn't mean that much to me but a little research tells me that 660 CCs is the same as a mid-weight motorcycle and around 44% of cars in Australia are 1400 to 2000 CCs. Just a little more powerful!

However, as you might have read back here, we loaded our little blue car up for a camping trip in October and not just drove on 120 km/h expressway, but also up mountains, and the engine size didn't seem to be a problem!

What's intriguing is that the manufacturers took those dimensions and built cars to suit: making cars that just fit inside the maximums.

Driving around in Japan you see a lot of Kei cars. They are easy to spot: they have yellow or black number plates. In 2018 seven of the top 10 selling models were Kei Cars. Our car, the Honda N-box, has been the top selling mini for nine consecutive years, many times in those nine years it's also been the top car overall.

Other benefits from owning a Kei car, aside from fitting better through narrow spaces and making parking a breeze, are the financial incentives. It's cheaper to register them, to get the two-yearly roadworthy certificate, and even cheaper on road tolls. It was much faster to get our parking permit from the police too (required whenever you buy a car in Japan—they confirm that you actually have a place to park it regularly).

Many Japanese people who live in the city don't use their car for regular commutes to work or to take their kids to school. This (small) 2000 survey said around 60% of students and workers use public transport for their daily commute. Among the students surveyed (I presume university-aged students) 18% ride their bikes and 7% walk. Elementary-aged school children in Japan almost all walk to school.

It's a very different scenario to Australia, where the top 10 cars are mostly SUVs of varying sizes and where more than 50% of people drive to work and more than 50% of kids get driven to school. From experience very few people use bikes to do daily stuff like commuting or shopping.

I'm still learning about this country I live in. It's good to stay curious!