Japanese Overnight Buses

The location, scale and equipment of terminals are totally different that is depending on terminals


Bus terminals or ‘Bus center’ are mainly located in front of railway stations, but some terminals are further from the station.
An example of The Keikyu Shinagawa Bus Terminal in Tokyo is separated from Shinagawa Station (JR and Keikyu); it takes about 5 minutes on foot from the station.

How to say that a scale and equipments of bus terminal (or bus center) is totally different that is depending on terminals, from large-scale one equipped with various services to small-scale one that there is only for arrival and departure terminals. For instance, Kumamoto Bus Terminal (Kotsu Center in Japanese), the large-scale terminal and the most number of departure buses a day in Japan, is equipped with several facilities: ticket windows, toilets, waiting room, shower facility and lockers, Kumamoto Hanshin Department store and a hotel are above the terminal.

In addition, a shower facility is provided at Kumamoto Bus Terminal, or Kotsu Center. For the directions to this facility, ask the staff at the ticket window. The shower costs ¥200.

The Kumamoto Bus Terminal or Kotsu Center is the largest scale terminal in Japan.

Identifying bus stops


The overnight bus stops are different in some cities, but a brochure and the ticket, should help locate the stops. However, in big cities, bus stops can be mistaken.
These places are as follows:
  • Shinjuku (Tokyo)
  • Kyoto Station
  • Kobe Sannomiya
  • Osaka Umeda etc. 
There are many different routes and companies that are operated, so can be easily to mistake these stops when boarding.
 
Kyoto Station, for example, has five different bus stops. The JR Bus company (for Tokyo Station, Shinjuku Station, Tokyo Disney Land, Yokohama, Omiya, Shizuoka, Kanazawa, Toyama, Hiroshima, Matsue, Izumo, Matsuyama and Kochi) and the Hankyu Bus (for Toyama, Niigata, Nagano, Matsumoto, Shizuoka, Shimizu, Yokohama and Tokyo Shinagawa/Ikebukuro) leave from Chuo (main) Exit (the Hankyu Bus is Hotel New Hankyu). But, the Keihan Bus (for Tokyo Shibuya/Shinjuku, Chiba and Fukuoka), the Kintetsu Bus (for Aki, Nahari, Sukumo, Karuizawa, Kofu, Fuji Five Lakes, Matsuda, Odawara, Yokohama, Tokyo Station, the Northern Kanto, the Tohoku and the Kyushu regions), the Nankai Bus (for Nagaoka, Nagano, Kamakura, Tachikawa, Tokyo Akihabara, Narita Airport and Choshi) and the Nippon Chuo Bus company (for Saitama and Maebashi) departs from Hachijo (Shinkansen) Exit.

Caution, these stops can be different from the timetables Kyoto Station Hachijo Exit that are marked as the same place. That is, the distance of two stops between Hotel Keihan Kyoto (for the Keihan Bus) and Kintetsu Kyoto Station (for the Kintetsu Bus) is approximately 300 meters; it takes 5 minutes on foot for each stop. Be careful to determine which side of the station the bus stop is located, you must cross the station allow 10 minutes. Don't mistake the stop.


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