Stop Using Smartphones On Train Platforms, Japan's Railway Companies Ask

Above, a gathering place near the Hachiko statue at Shibuya Station is the place
 to fiddle with your smart phones, not on train platforms.  Photo by Armand Vaquer.

Japanese railway companies are asking people to refrain from using smartphone while on train station platforms.

According to Japan Daily Press:

Due to the increasing number of people falling on the train tracks while using smartphones, some railway companies are asking passengers to refrain from using the devices while on the train platforms. A fifth-grade boy fell onto the tracks at the JR Yotsuya Station in Tokyo on Monday and suffered minor injuries. The Metropolitan Police Department said the boy was not paying attention because he was focused on his mobile phone.

I noticed how Japanese people have their noses buried in their cell phones, particularly on trains.  On my last trip to Japan, I saw one girl twice (same girl, but on two different days) at a train station with one hand diddling with her phone and the other picking and pulling her hair's split ends.

There has been many a time I felt like telling someone to "put down the freaking phone!"  (In the U.S. as well as in Japan).

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