Central Japan Railway Company

The Central Japan Railway Company is the main railway company operating in the Chūbu (Nagoya) region of central Japan. It is officially abbreviated in English as JR Central and in Japanese as JR Tōkai . Its headquarters are located in the JR Central Towers in Nakamura-ku, Nagoya, Aichi Prefecture. The company's operational hub is Nagoya Station. The busiest railway line it operates is the Tōkaidō Main Line between Atami Station and Maibara Station. JR Central also operates the Tōkaidō Shinkansen between Tokyo Station and Shin-Ōsaka Station. Additionally it is responsible for the Chūō Shinkansen—a proposed Maglev service between Tokyo Station (or Shinagawa Station) and Ōsaka Station (or Shin-Ōsaka Station), of which a short demonstration section has been built. Currently, the company is conducting demonstrations of its shinkansen to railway officials from different countries in the effort to market bullet train technology overseas. JR Central is Japan's most profitable and highest throughput high speed rail operator, carrying 138 million high speed rail passengers in 2009, considerably more than the world's largest airline. Japan recorded a total of 289 million high speed rail passengers in 2009.