Like most Japanese cities, Kagoshima has a train system that connects different parts of the city to the rest of Kyushu. Unlike most cities, we don't have a subway system, because the city is at sea level. Instead, there's the street car system, which consists of two lines. The first, Taniyama, runs from the old Kagoshima station at the north end of the city, south past City Hall, then a bit southwest through Tenmonkan to Takamibaba Street, before making a sharp left turn to go back south through Korimoto, South Kagoshima, and finally to the other end of the line at Taniyama Station. The second line, Korimoto, also starts at the old Kagoshima Station and uses the same tracks through Tenmonkan to Takamibaba, but then continues straight to the new main Kagoshima Train Station, before turning south, and then east to terminate at Korimoto and then backtrack to the old Kagoshima Station. In effect, the two lines form a rectangle with stringy bits running out from the corners at Takamibaba and Korimoto.
I have a class Friday mornings at 10 AM down at South Kagoshima, and I usually take the 9:35 Taniyama line. One morning, I got to the Takamibaba intersection only to find that one of the cars had been knocked off the tracks. Given the lack of broken glass, it had either been hit by a big truck, or the driver just really wanted to get through the intersection before the light changed. There was no way that another car would be able to squeeze past to go down to Taniyama, but the next car coming up was for Korimoto and I just had enough time to run for the other platform to jump on the Korimoto car before it headed to the main train station.
At this point, the fork truck was just being maneuvered in for lifting the front of the errant car to put it back on the tracks. The Korimoto route is much longer than the Taniyama route to get to the shared platforms at Korimoto, and I got to the platform right at 10 AM. I was rifling through my papers, only to realize that I didn't have the student's number written down anywhere to let them know I was on my way, but would be late. We had to wait for the traffic light to change, so the car could go through and turn to the left to the Korimoto platform. There was a Taniyama car at the platform, waiting for the light to change in its direction. As we pulled into the platform, the Taniyama car pulled out and left several of us stranded by just a few seconds. Sigh. I'd gotten a transfer ticket, which now seemed useless. I looked down the tracks to see if I'd get lucky with one last car that had managed to get through Takamibaba before the accident. I didn't see anything, so I climbed the stairs to the crossover bridge to get across the tracks to the sidewalk. At the top, I looked back, and spotted a car marked "Old Kagoshima Station" changing lines and pulling up to the platform I'd just left. Hoping against hope that this car was being repurposed to take stranded people to Taniyama, I ran back down the steps and asked the driver when the next car might arrive for Taniyama. He just shrugged, apologized, said there was an accident at Takamibaba, and he didn't know if there'd be another car to Taniyama or not. Then, he drove off to Takamibaba.
I went back up the stairs, crossed over to the sidewalk side, then had to climb a different set of stairs to cross over the big street to get past the intersection and keep going south to South Kagoshima, which was at least half a mile away. Taking a taxi kind of crossed my mind, but there weren't any nearby, and I didn't want to pay the money for one. I ran half the way, and walked fast the other half. When I got to South Kagoshima, I had to trudge up the stairs for another crossover bridge over another big intersection. Finally, I got close the school, and I checked my phone - I'd just gotten a call from the student, asking if I was ok, but it would be faster at that point to climb the 2 flights of stairs to the class room and just enter the building than it would be to return the call. Fortunately, the student had seen the report of the tram accident on her smartphone, and expected that that's why I was late (I got in at 10:20). Unfortunately, the weather has turned hot in the last few days, and it took me most of the class time to catch my breath and stop sweating.
After the class ended, I took the Old Kagoshima line tram to return home. At 12 PM, we got about 6 blocks short of Takamibaba when the driver came on the PA to announce that there'd been an accident up ahead, and if we wanted to continue to Takamibaba or Tenmonkan, that we'd need to get out here and walk. Sigh. Fortunately, there was a 7-11 right across the street from where I got out, so I quickly got myself a bottle of water, and started walking.
At Takamibaba, some official, surrounded by a bunch of reporters, was loudly giving some kind of a speech in front of the derailed car, which was now back on the tracks, but on the wrong set of rails (for Tenmonkan, not Taniyama). A second car latched onto the first one and started pulling it in the direction of Tanimaya (the main streetcar yards are about a mile south of the main train station, and I think the idea was to pull the damaged car down to Korimoto, turn west, and get to the yards through a backdoor).
But, things could have been worst. It could have been raining.
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