Japan Railway group companies say a total of 2.38 million seats on their shinkansen bullet trains have been reserved for the upcoming spring-holiday period. The figure is an increase of 17 percent from last year.

The JR companies on Friday disclosed the number of bookings on the bullet trains, as of the previous day, for the 11-day period from April 26 to May 6.

The number of reservations on each line is as follows: The Hokkaido Shinkansen line has 97 percent of last year's figure, the Tohoku line has 108 percent, the Joetsu line shows 106 percent, and the Hokuriku line in the area served by East Japan Railway is 113 percent and the same line in the area served by West Japan Railway registers 115 percent.

Bookings on the Tokaido Shinkansen line are at 123 percent of last year's figure, the Sanyo line has 115 percent, the Kyushu line shows 109 percent and the Nishi Kyushu line is slightly down at 98 percent.

JR operators attribute the increase of bookings to a change that requires all the seats of the Nozomi trains on the Tokaido and Sanyo lines to have a reservation, as well as to the extension of the Hokuriku line in March.

The operators say that the impact of the coronavirus pandemic has mostly been eliminated.

They also say the peak of bookings of outbound travel is May 3, and that of return journey is May 6.