Originally Posted by
midtech
Any insight as to why the similarly named station is Osaka is almost always written as 'Nippombashi?' Is it solely for disambiguation, or due to local dialect/pronunciation or other historical reason?
"Nihon" and "Nippon" are different ways of pronouncing the Japanese name for Japan. The distinction nowadays is basically aesthetic, although "Nippon" was pushed as the official name of the country during WWII, presumably because the spitting motion involved in pronouncing it sounded a little more bad-..., so it has a bit more nationalist tinge to it.
Now one airline is called "All Nippon Airways" while the Japanese name for JAL is "Nihon Koku" ...