The City bus is the most commonly used transportation in Kyoto. It’s convenient for the locals to commute and for tourist to visit almost all major temples and shrines in the city. With the All-day Pass which is only 500 yen, you can take buses as many times as you need in a day.
Preparations : The bus route map is necessary to find the line you are taking from a hundred or more buses. It’s available at their ticket counters of the major City subway stations, or PDF can be download at their website. The Pass is available from a driver on a bus. But it doesn’t come with a map and sometimes a driver sells out all Passes of the day.
How to use a bus
The City Bus’s all-day pass is only valid for the City Bus, which are mostly green colored. Other private buses are not spotted often and they usually have red line. To use the Pass for the first time of the day, you put it through the printer beside the driver as you get off to mark the date of use. Then you just show a driver the Pass when using for the second time. Major bus stations have signs noticing an approach of the next bus.
Useful lines
Buses of three digits number are normally faster then two digits and sometimes skip minor stations. Besides, RAKU BUS are particularly convenient for tourists to visit popular temples in the city. The following three lines are most frequently used by tourists.
- #100 Kyoto Station – Sanjusangen-do Temple – Kiyomizu-dera Temple – Ginkakuji Temple – Nanzenji Temple
- #101 Kyoto Station – Nijo-jo Castle – Kinkakuji Temple
- #102 Ginkakuji Temple – Kinkakuji Temple
Lines not very useful
- #11, #28 – Connect Arashiyama district to Shijo Kawaramachi and Kyoto station respectively. It’s too far and the Pass is short the fare. You should take JR or Randen railway to get to Arashiyama.
- Some people don’t take any buses to get to Kinkakuji temple because it’s also located far northwest of the city center. For example, it takes about 50 minutes by the line #12 from Kinkakuji to Gion. To use subway and Hankyu Railway are worth 200 yen for more efficient transportation when you go directly between Kinakuji and the city center or Kyoto station.
Major lines map
Balloons show the popular tourist sites. Blue zone is out of the flat fare area which requires additional 150 to 250 yen to the All Day Pass validity.
View Kyoto bus route in a larger map
