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The potential effects of high-speed rail (HSR) reach into many overlapping fields of interest. This paper summarizes the evolution of HSR and elaborates on the development effects of the HSR transport infrastructure. HSR can simultaneously become a core component on desired urban developments, while also having undesirable outcomes. Positive impacts will be achieved only if interactions with other factors and contexts are maintained. This paper stratifies and expands the understanding of the development effects of HSR at three levels - regional, urban, and station area - based on the economic and temporal nature of all infrastructure projects. There is ample evidence that at the regional level, the implementation of an HSR service disrupts the existing network of cities along the proposed corridor. The HSR network changes the accessibility of a locality. Better accessibility will change the mobility patterns and will eventually affect the development in the impacted region, reshaping the entire urban-regional system. The HSR is expected to play a catalyzing role in driving the spatial and urban transformation process. This paper emphasizes the importance of establishing a synergy between HSR and urban development. A synergy between HSR and other elements, like urban transit facilities, paratransit, station area development, node, and sub-center development, can usher in spatial and economic development, but an institutional arrangement across all the elements is of paramount importance. Such a synergy would enhance livability and provide improved quality of life opportunities in cities and regions served by HSR. Last, an HSR corridor is beneficial both to the settlements along the corridor and to the railway operator. An HSR corridor is also beneficial to the cities along the railways, and the station areas provide an important opportunity to harness revenue through non-railway businesses. However, achieving the full development effects of an HSR project may take decades. Careful pre-planning of the project and coordination amongst the stakeholders are necessary to accomplish a set of phased goals to realize the envisioned development of an HSR corridor.

Depopulation is a phenomenon that is steadily but quietly eroding Japanese society, even in the greater Tokyo metropolitan area. Decline at the outer edges is already underway in earnest in places such as Chiba and Kanagawa Prefectures, but a fall in dynamism and a weakening of the centripetal pull of the large cities is noticeable even in central commuter areas.

The Compact City is attracting attention as perhaps one way forward for local urban regeneration. The success of this model depends on controlling an area’s population density. At the same time, there is a need to move forward with “wide-area cooperation” and “local government reform,” to increase the number of medium-sized cities in Japan to serve as “population reservoirs,” designed to reduce overconcentration in large cities, especially Tokyo.

Although large-scale regional development policies were pursued from the 1960s to rectify the unbalanced use of national land as the population centralized in the three major metropolitan areas of Tokyo, Osaka, and Nagoya, all of these maneuvers failed to achieve the desired results. From the late 1980s onward, overconcentration in Tokyo has been gaining ground.