[floatr][/floatr]Yomiuri: Agency proposes staggering Golden Week by region
The Golden Week holiday period is meant to be a time to kick back and enjoy the balmy late-spring weather, but it often ends up being an ordeal for vacationers stuck in interminable tailbacks on clogged roads at the beginning and end of the holiday. Aiming to remedy the situation, the Japan Tourism Agency has come up with the idea of setting different holiday periods for each region. The agency is considering revising the Law on National Holidays to allow the staggering of Golden Week and a similar period in autumn from 2012 or later to prevent tourist spots from becoming jam-packed and to reduce the incidence of traffic jams on expressways. The agency proposed the plan to schedule the major holiday periods in spring and autumn into five stretches at a meeting of the Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism Ministry's Tourism Nation Promotion Headquarters on Wednesday...more...

Heh ... last line:

Observers believe it will be difficult to realize the plan.

Except that, I believe this type of system has worked successfully for many years in some European countries. Germany being one example, if I remember correctly.

Can any European FGs confirm or refute this?

A good idea I think....the bureaucrats will be tugging at their barcodes over it though...

I know my family isn't the only one that travels to another part of Japan during the break to visit friends and relatives. This might make things a little difficult...

On the other hand, an extended vacation period would likely be good for the Okinawan economy, instead of cramming the bulk of spring tourism into four day or a week, spreading it over three weeks...

That's a good point, and now that I think about it, the idea of only one day with the relatives is starting to grow on me.

Yokohammer wrote:Heh ... last line:


Except that, I believe this type of system has worked successfully for many years in some European countries. Germany being one example, if I remember correctly.

Can any European FGs confirm or refute this?

Working perfectly well even in France...

Allow less clogging of highways... but in both directions...

Now if they could also implement this daily for company opening time... Tokyo might even become a lovely place...

Coligny wrote:Allow less clogging of highways...

I thought that was only because your mob stopped protesting about MuckDonald's.

Ketou wrote:A good idea I think....the bureaucrats will be tugging at their barcodes over it though...

I agree! This is a great idea! It's effective, offers enormous amounts of positives and only requires a little bit of flexibility until people get used to its benefits....just like daylight savings.

From a congestion perspective it's a great idea. For anyone who has friends or relatives in a different part of Japan though it's a disaster.

Observers believe it will be difficult to realize the plan."

in a country where people are happy being told what to do and when to do it?

Yokohammer wrote:Heh ... last line:


Except that, I believe this type of system has worked successfully for many years in some European countries. Germany being one example, if I remember correctly.

Can any European FGs confirm or refute this?

We have it too, and by god it works! (German province of Holland here)

Not sure how it would work for a country that won't implement DST for fear of "confusion", however.

Tsuru wrote:We have it too, and by god it works! (German province of Holland here)

Is it the same as what is being proposed here? I mean, different regions of the countries have holidays enforced for different weeks? Is there more flexibility to the system in Holland?

FG Lurker wrote:Is it the same as what is being proposed here? I mean, different regions of the countries have holidays enforced for different weeks? Is there more flexibility to the system in Holland?

It's exactly the same. The country is divvied up in to three regions (north-middle-south) and every major holiday is offset by one week for every region. It's genius.

A step in the right direction, possibly.
But here's anther idea. Fuck these national holiday weeks and just toughen labor laws and force Japanese employers to let people actually USE their personal vacation days and take time off whenever they want to.

Coligny wrote:Working perfectly well even in France...

Tsuru wrote:We have it too, and by god it works! (German province of Holland here)

Thanks guys!
That's what I thought. Makes perfectly good sense to me. I think it's a great idea, especially in a country like Japan where transportation and lodgings are totally overloaded every time there's a major holiday.
But of course "makes sense" is not always a prime criterion for decision making here.

Tsuru wrote:It's exactly the same. The country is divvied up in to three regions (north-middle-south) and every major holiday is offset by one week for every region. It's genius.

Just curious, what happens when family and friends live in different regions?

Level3 wrote:A step in the right direction, possibly.
But here's anther idea. Fuck these national holiday weeks and just toughen labor laws and force Japanese employers to let people actually USE their personal vacation days and take time off whenever they want to.

I like this idea. Cut the number of national holidays in half, double the number of days of manditory paid leave to 20, and make sure people can and do use their leave.

I'm curious if the government is ever going to carry out this plan this year because it's already March and people need to start making plans for the holidays.

IkemenTommy wrote:I'm curious if the government is ever going to carry out this plan this year because it's already March and people need to start making plans for the holidays.

"The agency is considering revising the Law on National Holidays to allow the staggering of Golden Week and a similar period in autumn from 2012 or later"

Adhesive wrote:Just curious, what happens when family and friends live in different regions?

I was wondering this too, but perhaps it would give people a good reason (excuse) use some of their paid vacation days...

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I might be a bit slow here, but the way I see it a lot of people I know take April 30th off in order to extend the golden week to a 7 day break (April 29th through May 5th) will be stuck with only a 5 day break regardless of location.

CrankyBastard wrote:I might be a bit slow here, but the way I see it a lot of people I know take April 30th off in order to extend the golden week to a 7 day break (April 29th through May 5th) will be stuck with only a 5 day break regardless of location.

That only works on the years when the calendar cooperates, probably about half the time overall with the various possible combinations.

With the proposed system if a person took two days of holidays they could end up with a 9 day block off instead of only 5 or 7...

The more I think about this the more I like it. The weeks for each region are also well chosen, moving from southern Japan to northern Japan. This is perhaps the most shocking thing of all considering how Tokyo-centric Japan is... (Giving Okinawa their GW holiday at the end of May could drop them in to the start of an early rainy season.)

The whole thing is such a good idea that I suspect it will never see the light of day.

Adhesive wrote:Just curious, what happens when family and friends live in different regions?

We usually use our holidays to drive or fly to warmer or snowier regions and by using this system we eliminate a lot of the congestion (ask Coligny about Black Saturday), visiting relatives is more commonly done on the weekend and religious 1- or 2-day holidays like easter or christmas, which are of course the same in the whole country.

If a conflict is completely unavoidable for whatever reason, we still have our on average 25 paid days off per year which we are free to use how we see fit. This rule of staggered holidays is more for schools and civil cervants, but of course for people with kids this pretty much defines how they will allocate these 25 days throughout the year.

I'm just wondering if the "Holidays for Kinki Bloc" means we've all got to do kinda weird shit during that period?

Screwed-down Hairdo wrote:I'm just wondering if the "Holidays for Kinki Bloc" means we've all got to do kinda weird shit during that period?

If that's the case, we should get an early start in practicing, just to make sure we're ready, right?

Well, I was already kinda doing that (albeit with myself....), but I kinda liked the idea of getting a week's worth of holidays for it, too. It will be interesting to see who volunteers to be eligible.

Screwed-down Hairdo wrote:Well, I was already kinda doing that (albeit with myself....), but I kinda liked the idea of getting a week's worth of holidays for it, too. It will be interesting to see who volunteers to be eligible.

Well, working out by one's self does have merit Hair, but I just checked with my avatar and she said she is willing to assist with the curriculum, seems a bit more advantageous to me....

Only Hokkaido students would be able to see cherry blossoms.

ashinoato wrote:Only Hokkaido students would be able to see cherry blossoms.

You can't do hanami on the weekend?