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This is typical in most countries that aren't very small. I'm struggling to think of a moderately-sized country that doesn't work have regional transit authorities with their own ticketing systems. I haven't been everywhere in the world so I bet they do exist, but I've yet to see one.

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While Japan has regional ticketing systems and companies, they did standardize nationally on supporting 3 major prepaid transit cards (pasmo, suica, icoca) so most rapid transit and regional transit are low friction enough to just tap in and tap out. China has done the same with T-Union.

I suppose with NFC contactless payment, a plausible future state is just supporting credit card payments everywhere, though of course this doesn't solve the monthly pass problem.

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