One of my favorite pastimes in Japan is watching and riding the trains. The transportation system in Japan is second to none. There are 8,174 Train stations in Japan as of June, 2026. Very few destinations in Japan require you to rent a car, and taking the train is much more convenient and fun. In the big cities, most destinations are within a twenty-minute walk of a train station. And if that’s too far, like an old fart like me, there are always buses and taxis.
Of all the train stations in Japan, my favorite is Kyoto Station. Kyoto Station doesn’t look like anything else in Kyoto, and that’s the argument people keep having about it. Hiroshi Hara finished it in 1997: fifteen stories of steel and glass laid out along a 470-meter atrium, a cliff face of girders that reflects whatever the sky is doing that day. You come off the Shinkansen expecting the old capital and instead walk into something closer to a steel-and-glass canyon. The Grand Staircase climbs 171 steps up the east side, and on some evenings the risers run with light patterns that pull a crowd to the bottom, phones and video cameras out. I will dig out that video later for a post.
A city that spent twelve centuries perfecting the wooden temple decided its front door should be this. Above the platforms it stacks a department store, a hotel, a theater, and a rooftop garden most travelers never find. Cross the Skyway on the eleventh floor and Kyoto opens up below: tile roofs running toward the hills, Kyoto Tower blinking red across the road. Then you ride the escalator down, walk out the north gate, and the old city is right there.
At the lower level of the station is the entrance to the Miyako City Kintetsu Kyoto Station hotel. What makes this place so interesting is that it runs the length of the tracks entering the station. Every room on the north side can see the train tracks. But the best rooms are the ones on the end. It’s a long walk to get to the end rooms, but if you are a train lover like me, it’s worth every step. The time-lapse video above was taken with my Panasonic Lumix camera on a simple mini tripod on a tabletop from the corner of our hotel room.
It’s very convenient to have your room right inside the station. You could spend several days there and not see all the shops and restaurants right inside the station. The only issue is that if you are a smoker, there is no smoking anywhere inside the station, including the hotel room. To have a smoke, you need to go outside at the north street entrance, and there you will find a glassed-in smoking area you can use. But whatever you do, don’t go outside the station after the trains stop running because you will be locked out.
This is why I know: My wife’s only vice is that she smokes two or three cigarettes a day. It was past 1 a.m., and she left the hotel room to go to the smoking area. She was locked out and did not have her phone with her. I was waiting in the room, and after twenty minutes she didn’t return, so I figured I’d better head to the smoking area and see what’s up. She was outside the door talking to the guard, who would not let her in because she had no proof on her that she was staying at the hotel. I opened the door and called her inside. Needless to say, that was the last time she had a smoke in Kyoto Station.
