General News

People Bid Farewell to Japan’s Easternmost Train Station

The Yomiuri Shimbun
Residents and rail fans gather at the Higashi-Nemuro Station platform in Hokkaido on Friday to bid farewell to the station.

Jiji Press

17:31 JST, March 15, 2025

NEMURO, Hokkaido (Jiji Press) — Higashi-Nemuro Station marked its final day of operations Friday, with local residents and rail enthusiasts bidding farewell to the easternmost train station in Japan.

The unstaffed station in the city of Nemuro, Hokkaido, was opened in 1961 on the Nemuro Main Line, chiefly for use by students commuting to and from a nearby high school.

As the number of users is unlikely to recover from the prolonged slump, however, Hokkaido Railway Co., or JR Hokkaido, has decided to close the station in conjunction with its timetable revision scheduled for Saturday.

Struggling with an earnings slump, JR Hokkaido is also set to abolish four other stations in its service area in line with the timetable revision. After the closure of Higashi-Nemuro, Nemuro Station, one of the two terminals of the Nemuro Main Line and next to Higashi-Nemuro, will return as the easternmost station in the country for the first time in 64 years.

While having no station building, Higashi-Nemuro offers “a unique charm” with its roofless wooden platform, Kazuo Suzuki, 52, who heads a group of rail enthusiasts in the city of Nemuro, said. He has continued to support the station’s operations and its users, including high school students, by doing tasks such as pulling weeds in the spring and removing snow in the winter.

Suzuki said: “I feel sad about the closure because I’ve been attached to the station since I was a child. I’m truly grateful.”

On the final day, commemorative postcards were given to passengers, and group members and local residents displayed a specially designed banner for arriving and departing trains.

The number of rail fans visiting the station has increased since its closure was announced in December last year.

Ryosuke Kakoi, 44, spent two days traveling to Higashi-Nemuro by rail from the city of Anjo, Aichi Prefecture, central Japan. He said: “I’ve wanted to come here for a long time. The announcement of the closure was shocking.”