Thinking of traveling from Tokyo to Osaka? Take a shinkansen bullet train or fly and it will set you back around ¥14,000. But if you share the costs of making the trip by car, you'll likely pay half that or less.
Called "car-sharing," the practice of hopping a lift by arrangement with a stranger is becoming increasingly popular these days, as more and more people warm to a way of getting from A to B that can be much more fun than public transport and, for drivers, a remunerative way to beat the boredom of making a long journey alone.
To make such arrangements, many are now consulting "notteco!" ("Let's ride!"), a Web site at notteco.jp/ that lists hundreds of people offering or seeking ride-share mates through postings reading along the lines of, "On Sept. 25, from Tokyo to Fukuoka . . . "