Hakone Tozan Cable Car

The line owes its existence to resort development rather than to through traffic. The Odawara Electric Railway acquired land at Gōra in 1911 and sold it as a district of inns and holiday villas, but the ground there is steeply pitched; the cable car was conceived to serve the residents of that villa district and, at the same time, to form part of a sightseeing loop around Hakone. The company applied for a construction licence in 1912 and was granted it on 23 April 1915.

Construction was held back while work on the company's adhesion railway line took priority, and it was only after that line opened that building began, in 1921. The whole installation — rails, cars and winding gear alike — was imported from Switzerland, and the funicular opened on 1 December 1921. It was the second cable railway to open in Japan, after the Ikoma funicular of 1918, and the first in the Kantō region. On 1 July 1922 the lower terminus, then called Shimo-Gōra, was renamed Gōra Station.

When the Great Kantō Earthquake struck on 1 September 1923 the line escaped with only minor damage, but its repair was given low priority and service did not resume until 21 March 1925; the upper terminus, originally Kami-Gōra, was renamed Sōunzan on 10 July 1926. Corporate ownership shifted over the following years: the Odawara Electric Railway was absorbed into Nippon Denryoku on 1 January 1928, and on 16 August that year the railway and tramway operations, this line among them, were spun off to the Hakone Tozan Railway. During the Second World War the funicular was designated a non-essential line; it was suspended after 10 February 1944, and every facility except the Sōunzan station building was sold off and removed for the war effort.

The cable car was brought back into service on 1 July 1950, and on the same day a company bus route between Sōunzan and Koshiri opened, allowing passengers to reach Lake Ashi entirely over the operator's own lines. The upper-area station named Sōunkan was renamed Kami-Gōra (its second bearer of that name) on 1 May 1951. Decades later, after the adhesion railway line had moved to three-car trains, the funicular too was upgraded to carry more passengers: it was suspended from 25 November 1994 until 15 March 1995, and Swiss-built two-car trainsets entered service on 16 March 1995.

A further round of equipment renewal followed in 2019: services were suspended after 2 December 2019, retiring the 1995 vehicles, and fifth-generation cars — two new two-car red and blue trainsets each able to carry up to 250 passengers — resumed operation on 20 March 2020. On 1 April 2024, as part of a reorganisation of the Odakyu Hakone group, the line's operating company was changed from the Hakone Tozan Railway to Odakyu Hakone, the name under which the funicular runs today.

• 1911The Odawara Electric Railway acquires land at Gōra and sells it as a district of inns and holiday villas, the setting that would prompt the cable line.
• 191523 April: a construction licence for the line is granted (applied for in 1912).
• 19211 December: the funicular opens, with all equipment imported from Switzerland — the second cable railway in Japan after Ikoma (1918) and the first in the Kantō region.
• 19221 July: the lower terminus, then called Shimo-Gōra, is renamed Gōra Station.
• 19231 September: the line suffers only minor damage in the Great Kantō Earthquake, but repairs are deferred.
• 192521 March: service resumes after the earthquake.
• 192610 July: the upper terminus, originally Kami-Gōra, is renamed Sōunzan Station.
• 19281 January: the Odawara Electric Railway is merged into Nippon Denryoku; on 16 August the railway and tramway lines, this line included, are spun off to the Hakone Tozan Railway.
• 194410 February: suspended as a non-essential wartime line; every facility except the Sōunzan station building is sold off and removed.
• 19501 July: postwar resumption of service; a company bus between Sōunzan and Koshiri opens the same day, completing an all-own-lines route to Lake Ashi.
• 19511 May: the station then named Sōunkan is renamed Kami-Gōra (the second station to bear that name).
• 199516 March: after a suspension from 25 November 1994, Swiss-built two-car trainsets enter service following an upgrade for heavier traffic.
• 202020 March: fifth-generation cars (two two-car red and blue trainsets, up to 250 passengers each) resume service after a renewal that suspended operation from 2 December 2019.
• 20241 April: as part of an Odakyu Hakone group reorganisation, the operating company changes from the Hakone Tozan Railway to Odakyu Hakone.