Akechi Line

The railway began life as part of a much longer projected route. Under the revised Railway Construction Act its corridor figured in planned line No. 63 — the so-called Enbi Line, intended to run from Kakegawa in Shizuoka via Futamata, Ōno, Urakawa and Busetsu to Ōi in Gifu. Only the Ōi (present-day Ena)–Akechi portion was built, its construction secured largely through the efforts of Furuya Yoshitaka, a Gifu member of the House of Representatives. Work was carried out in stages between 1933 and 1934.

The first section, from Ōi to Agi, opened on 24 May 1933, with Higashino and Agi stations. It was extended from Agi to Iwamura on 26 January 1934, and from Iwamura on to Akechi on 24 June of the same year, completing the through line and opening Tōyama and Akechi stations. The route deliberately swung east through the village of Agi, which the earlier Iwamura Electric Tramway (opened 1906 between Iwamura and Ōi, and the first private railway in Gifu) had not served; that detour is the reason the Ōi–Iibama stretch is so curved, steep and tunnelled. The tramway was abolished in 1935, after the Akechi Line opened.

As a lightly used branch the line was repeatedly a candidate for closure. In 1957–58 JNR, having just reopened the wartime-suspended Hakuhō Line as a dedicated bus road, studied converting the poorly performing Akechi Line to a bus route in the same way, but dropped the idea because of the gradients. In 1968 a JNR advisory committee recommended abandonment as one of the "Deficit 83 Lines"; that programme stalled and the line survived. After the JNR Reconstruction Act, however, it was designated a first-round Specified Local Line marked for closure in 1981, and on 18 September 1981 its abolition was approved.

Rather than close, the line was transferred to the new third-sector operator. On 16 November 1985 the 25.2-kilometre JNR Akechi Line was abolished and reopened the same day as the Akechi Railway Akechi Line, Ena to Akechi, measured at 25.1 km; Akechi Station was given the slightly different spelling 明智 to match the local place name. Under private operation the company added several new stations — Iinuma in 1991, Noshi in 1994 and Gokuraku in 2008 — and renamed Hanashiro to Hanashiro-onsen in 2011.

The line gradually shed its older infrastructure and reshaped its services. Freight had already ended on 1 February 1981. In March 2004 the signalling was changed to a special automatic block system, retiring what were the last semaphore signals in the Chūbu region. From 12 March 2011 a once-daily limited express, the Taishō Roman Gō, was introduced, running every day except Mondays; on its southbound Akechi-bound run it carries a dining car, and it is timed deliberately slower than the all-stations trains so diners can enjoy the scenery.

That dining service is now central to the line's identity. Akechi Railway runs one round-trip a day with a dining car offering seasonal regional cuisine built around ingredients such as kanten (agar, a local Yamaoka speciality), jinenjo yam and mushrooms — the "kanten train" and "mushroom train" among them — alongside sake-tasting runs, monthly events letting children and adults try driving a diesel railcar, occasional steam operation and charter trains. The line has also drawn visitors through television: the railcars carried wraps tied to NHK's 2018 serial Half Blue and its 2020 drama Kirin ga Kuru, the latter centred on the warlord Akechi Mitsuhide whose name the terminus shares.

• 193324 May: the first section, Ōi (present-day Ena)–Agi (10.0 km), opens; Higashino and Agi stations open.
• 193426 January: the line is extended from Agi to Iwamura (5.0 km); Iwamura station opens.
• 193424 June: the line is extended from Iwamura to Akechi (10.2 km), completing the through route; Tōyama and Akechi stations open.
• 195620 December: Tōyama Station is renamed Yamaoka Station.
• 195910 January: Iibama Station opens.
• 19631 November: Ōi Station is renamed Ena Station.
• 196715 November: Hanashiro Station opens.
• 1968A JNR advisory committee recommends abandonment as one of the 'Deficit 83 Lines', but the programme stalls and the line survives.
• 19811 February: freight services are discontinued. 18 September: the line is approved for closure as a first-round Specified Local Line.
• 198516 November: the 25.2 km JNR Akechi Line is abolished and reopens the same day as the Akechi Railway Akechi Line (Ena–Akechi, 25.1 km); Akechi Station is respelled 明智 to match the place name.
• 199128 October: Iinuma Station opens under Akechi Railway operation.
• 199415 December: Noshi Station opens.
• 200425 March: signalling is changed to a special automatic block system, retiring the last semaphore signals in the Chūbu region.
• 200825 December: Gokuraku Station opens.
• 201112 March: Hanashiro Station is renamed Hanashiro-onsen Station, and the Taishō Roman Gō limited express (with seasonal dining car) begins running.