The core idea: the gate only needs to know where you got on
A kōsoku dōro (高速道路), literally high-speed road, is fenced off from ordinary roads, and you can join or leave it only at an interchange. The toll depends on the distance between your entrance and your exit, and you pay it at the ryōkinjo (料金所), literally fee place, as you leave. At the entrance nothing is charged; the gate only records where you came in.
ETC, electronic toll collection, does the recording by radio: a unit in the car, the shasaiki (車載器), literally vehicle-mounted device, reads the ETC card slotted into it and talks to an antenna over the lane. Without ETC, the record is a paper ticket. People talk about the expressway the way they talk about trains: you ride it, noru, and get off it, oriru. Two friends planning a drive might say this.
| Japanese | Romaji | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 高速に乗ろうか。 | Kōsoku ni norō ka. | Shall we take the expressway? |
| 次のインターで降りよう。 | Tsugi no intā de oriyō. | Let's get off at the next interchange. |
| ETCカード、ちゃんと入ってる？ | ETC kādo, chanto haitteru? | Is the ETC card in properly? |
| 高速代はいくらぐらいかな。 | Kōsoku-dai wa ikura gurai ka na. | I wonder how much the toll will be. |
The lane boards: purple, green and the split board
As you approach the plaza, a board over each lane tells you who may use it, and it is really an answer to the core question: how will you prove where you got on? ETC sen'yō (ETC専用), literally ETC exclusive use, appears in purple: only cars with a working ETC unit and card. Ippan (一般), literally general, appears in green: drivers who stop to take a ticket or pay. The split board ETC/ippan, purple on the left and green on the right, accepts both, so an ETC car may be crawling behind someone paying cash.
Across each ETC lane stands the kaihei bā (開閉バー), literally open-close bar. The NEXCO companies, which run most intercity expressways, state the rule plainly: slow to 20 km/h or less before the lane and crawl through, because the bar stays shut if the card is missing or badly inserted. A small roadside display shows whether the card was read. A passenger helping you choose will say something like this.
| Japanese | Romaji | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| ここ、ETC専用だよ。 | Koko, ETC sen'yō da yo. | This one's ETC only. |
| 一般のレーンに入って。 | Ippan no rēn ni haitte. | Get into the ippan lane. |
| バーが開いたのを確かめてから進んでね。 | Bā ga aita no o tashikamete kara susunde ne. | Make sure the bar has opened before you go. |
| Lane board | Reading | Colour | Who uses it |
|---|---|---|---|
| ETC専用 | ETC sen'yō | Purple | ETC cars only; slow to 20 km/h and roll through |
| ETC/一般 | ETC/ippan | Purple and green | ETC cars and cars that stop to pay |
| 一般 | ippan | Green | Cars without ETC: take a ticket or pay |
| ETC/サポート | ETC/sapōto | Purple and white | At ETC-only plazas: ETC cars, and cars that cannot use ETC, which stop at the bar |
Without ETC: the ticket, the booth and the machine
In an ippan lane at the entrance, a machine pushes out a tsūkōken (通行券), literally passage ticket, which records the interchange where you joined. Take it and keep it flat. At your exit, choose an ippan lane again. At a staffed booth, hand the ticket to the kakariin (係員), the attendant, who tells you the toll; at an unstaffed one, feed it into the payment machine and follow the screen. Booths take cash and, in most places, credit cards, and you can also hand over an ETC card to be charged.
The attendant speaks polite Japanese and you answer with desu and masu. The whole exchange takes about ten seconds.
| Japanese | Romaji | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 通行券をお取りください。 | Tsūkōken o otori kudasai. | Please take your ticket. (the entrance machine) |
| 通行券をお願いします。 | Tsūkōken o onegai shimasu. | Your ticket, please. (the attendant) |
| 千三百二十円です。 | Sen-sanbyaku-nijū-en desu. | That's 1,320 yen. |
| カードでお願いします。 | Kādo de onegai shimasu. | By card, please. |
| 領収書もお願いします。 | Ryōshūsho mo onegai shimasu. | A receipt too, please. |
| ありがとうございました。お気をつけて。 | Arigatō gozaimashita. Oki o tsukete. | Thank you. Drive safely. |
When the bar stays down: the intercom and what to say
NEXCO East says that about one car in a thousand is stopped by a closed bar, and that more than half of those cases come from a card that was forgotten or not pushed fully in. If it happens to you, stop, turn on the hazard lights and stay in the car. Never reverse: cars behind you are still rolling through. Press the intāhon (インターホン), the intercom beside the lane, and wait; staff will talk you through it or come over.
The attendant needs to know what went wrong and, since the gate has no record of your entry, where you joined. Answer in short polite sentences.
| Japanese | Romaji | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| ETCカードを入れ忘れました。 | ETC kādo o iremasuremashita. | I forgot to put the ETC card in. |
| バーが開きませんでした。 | Bā ga akimasen deshita. | The bar didn't open. |
| どちらから乗られましたか。 | Dochira kara noraremashita ka. | Where did you get on? (the attendant) |
| 中山インターから乗りました。 | Nakayama intā kara norimashita. | I got on at Nakayama interchange. |
| 間違えてETC専用レーンに入ってしまいました。 | Machigaete ETC sen'yō rēn ni haitte shimaimashita. | I went into the ETC-only lane by mistake. |
| 通行券をなくしてしまいました。 | Tsūkōken o nakushite shimaimashita. | I've lost my ticket. |
Inside the box: IC, JCT, SA and PA
Because you pay only when you leave, the places along the road fall into two kinds: those that let you out and those that do not. An IC (インターチェンジ, intāchenji) connects the expressway with ordinary roads, and its toll booth is where you take a ticket on the way in and pay on the way out. A JCT (ジャンクション, jankushon) links one expressway to another; you change roads without leaving the box, so there is usually no booth. An SA (サービスエリア, sābisu eria) and a PA (パーキングエリア, pākingu eria) are rest areas inside the box. As a rule an SA is larger, with restaurants and usually fuel, while a PA may have only toilets, vending machines and a small shop, though some large PAs outdo small SAs. If you ride rather than drive, the post on highway buses covers rest stops from the passenger seat.
The signs follow the same logic. On expressways, direction signs are white on green, while ordinary roads use white on blue. Exit numbers sit in a small white box, route numbers such as E1 have been added since 2017, and an exit that only ETC cars may use carries a purple patch. In speech, IC becomes intā, and SA and PA are said in full or as esu-ē and pī-ē. Rest areas often come in two halves, one for each direction: nobori (上り), usually towards Tokyo, and kudari (下り), away from it.
| Japanese | Romaji | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 次のサービスエリアで休憩しよう。 | Tsugi no sābisu eria de kyūkei shiyō. | Let's take a break at the next service area. |
| 出口まであと二キロだよ。 | Deguchi made ato ni-kiro da yo. | Two more kilometres to the exit. |
| 次のジャンクションは左だよ。 | Tsugi no jankushon wa hidari da yo. | Keep left at the next junction. |
| このパーキングはトイレしかないね。 | Kono pākingu wa toire shika nai ne. | This parking area only has toilets. |
Beyond the basics: speed signs, ETC-only gates and flat tolls
Speed first. On national expressways the legal maximum is generally 100 km/h unless signs say otherwise, some sections are signed for 120, and the legal minimum is 50. Saikō sokudo (最高速度), literally highest speed, is the red-ringed limit; saitei sokudo (最低速度), literally lowest speed, is a blue disc with a line under the number. Many limits appear on electronic boards that drop to 80 or 50 in rain, fog or roadworks, so trust the board over your memory. The shapes and colours of ordinary road signs are covered in a separate post on road and traffic signs.
Second, ETC-only gates. In December 2020 the transport ministry and the expressway companies published a roadmap for making toll plazas ETC-only, and a growing number of entrances around Tokyo already take nothing else. The small sumāto IC (スマートIC) exits, many of them linked to rest areas, are ETC-only by design. If you enter an ETC-only gate without a working card, go to the lane marked sapōto (サポート), support, stop at the bar and follow instructions; depending on the road, you pay at a machine there or later by a payment slip.
Third, not every stretch uses tickets. Some sections charge a flat toll at a honsen ryōkinjo (本線料金所), a mainline toll plaza, and the urban expressways around Tokyo and Osaka run their own systems built around ETC. The core idea still holds: the gate needs one fact, here simply the flat fare.
| Japanese | Romaji | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 最高速度は百キロです。 | Saikō sokudo wa hyakkiro desu. | The speed limit is 100 km/h. |
| 雨で八十キロ規制になってるね。 | Ame de hachijukkiro kisei ni natteru ne. | It's down to 80 because of the rain. |
| スマートICはETC車しか使えません。 | Sumāto IC wa ETC-sha shika tsukaemasen. | Only ETC cars can use a smart IC. |
Common mistakes at Japanese toll gates
Following the car ahead into a purple lane. The cause is momentum: at speed the boards blur and you trust the driver in front. The fix is to choose your lane early by its kanji, ippan if you have no card.
Reversing when the bar stays down. The cause is panic and the habit of backing out of a wrong turn. Stop, switch on the hazard lights and use the intercom instead.
Arriving too fast. Visitors used to free-flow toll gantries at home expect to drive straight through. Slow to 20 km/h or less, ready to stop.
Taking an SA sign for an exit, or a JCT for an IC. The cause is that every expressway sign is green. Look for deguchi (出口), exit, and the exit number; JCT means another expressway and SA means a rest stop.
Inserting the card after joining. You remember it at the first plaza, but the entrance was never recorded. Insert it before you drive in, and if you forgot, use a staffed lane at the exit.