It's Monday morning and Tokyo is going back to work. By 8:16 at Shinjuku Station, the world's busiest, lines of waiting commuters overlap with the people looking to go in the opposite direction. The smell of pastries from a bakery wafts over the stream of people.
As a train approaches platform 2 on Tokyo Metro Co.'s Marunouchi Line, the number 50 appears on a digital sign, indicating the train will stay 50 seconds longer than usual. That's because the following train, due in two minutes, has been delayed and is already packed. Each 12 seconds of delay adds about 80 people and makes a train 10 percent more crowded, according to Tokyo Metro.
The clock begins to count down and assistant stationmaster Takashi Arai steps onto a wooden dais.