YOKOHAMA--One day in late April, railway staffer Misaki Honma was taking down posters to promote travel packages and tickets inside the gates at JR Higashi-Kanagawa Station in Kanagawa Ward.

SAGAMIHARA, Kanagawa Prefecture--A massive hole here will one day house an underground station for the maglev Chuo Shinkansen Line as excavation work continues. The new station, tentatively called ...