Jukkokutōge Cable Car

The line takes its name from the pass it serves. "Jukkoku" means "ten provinces," and the summit is so called because, on a clear day, ten of the old provinces of Japan — Izu, Sagami, Suruga, Tōtōmi, Kai, Awa, Kazusa, Shimōsa, Musashi and Shinano — are said to be visible from it, along with several of the Izu Islands. The summit station sits on the boundary between Kannami and the city of Atami, and from the observation deck the view in good weather can reach as far as Tokyo Tower and the Tokyo Skytree. The cable car thus functions less as everyday transport than as the centrepiece of a hilltop sightseeing destination on the Atami–Hakone tourist route.

The line opened on 16 October 1956, built and operated by the Sunzu Railway Company. To equip it cheaply, the builders reused apparatus salvaged from the Myōken cable railway in Hyōgo Prefecture, which had been closed during the Second World War as a non-essential wartime line; much of its principal machinery dated from 1925. Because that salvaged equipment came from one of the few standard-gauge cable railways in Japan, the new Jukkoku line was itself laid to standard gauge. Its two cars, numbered 1 and 2 and built by Hitachi in 1955, have run since opening day; car 1 (blue) carries the nickname "Hikami" and car 2 (red) the nickname "Jukkoku."

On 1 June 1957, less than a year after opening, the Sunzu Railway changed its name to the Izuhakone Railway, and the funicular spent the following decades as part of that Seibu Group company's operations. For many years the two cars wore the colours of the Seibu Lions baseball team; this Lions livery was retained until 2018, when, in July of that year, the cars were repainted in a new design based on their original 1956 appearance, with a stylised Mount Fuji across the centre of each body.

A change of ownership came in the early 2020s. In December 2021 the Izuhakone Railway split off the operating division for the cable car and its accompanying rest house through a company division, creating the new Jukkokutōge Co., which took over running the line. On 1 February 2022 all of that company's shares were sold to Fuji Kyuko, bringing the line into the Fujikyu Group. The new operator then renovated the facilities: on 11 August 2022 part of the summit station building and its observation deck reopened as the "PANORAMA TERRACE 1059" lookout and "TENGOKU CAFE," and on 5 November 2022 the cable car was rebranded the "Jukkokutōge Panorama Cable Car," its two stations were renamed — the base from Jukkoku-noboriguchi to Jukkokutōge-Sanroku and the summit from Jukkokutōge to Jukkokutōge-Sanchō — and the foot-of-the-hill rest house reopened as "Mori no Eki Hakone Jukkoku-tōge."

The line's standard gauge has left it a genuine rarity. Most cable cars in Japan, including the Izuhakone Railway's own former Komagatake funicular (closed in 2005), use the 1,067 mm narrow gauge; in Shizuoka Prefecture only the Tōkaidō Shinkansen and this funicular run on standard-gauge track. When the Nose Electric Railway's Myōken-no-Mori Cable — the descendant of the very line whose equipment had been transplanted to Jukkoku in 1956 — closed on 4 December 2023, the Jikkoku Cable Line became the sole remaining standard-gauge cable car in Japan. With the line now around seventy years old and spare parts increasingly hard to secure, its operator has announced that a replacement slope-car system is planned to open in the summer of 2027.

• 195616 October: the Jikkoku Cable Line opens, built and operated by the Sunzu Railway Company; it reuses equipment salvaged from the wartime-closed Myōken cable railway in Hyōgo (principal machinery dating from 1925), which is why it is laid to standard gauge.
• 19571 June: the Sunzu Railway changes its name to the Izuhakone Railway, a Seibu Group company.
• 2018July: the two cars, which had until then worn Seibu Lions colours, are repainted in a new design based on the line's original 1956 appearance, with a stylised Mount Fuji across each body.
• 20211 December: the Izuhakone Railway splits off the operating division for the cable car and its rest house through a company division, creating the new Jukkokutōge Co., which takes over the line.
• 20221 February: all shares in Jukkokutōge Co. are sold to Fuji Kyuko, bringing the line into the Fujikyu Group.
• 202211 August: part of the summit station building and its observation deck reopen after renovation as the 'PANORAMA TERRACE 1059' lookout and 'TENGOKU CAFE'.
• 20225 November: the cable car is rebranded the 'Jukkokutōge Panorama Cable Car'; its stations are renamed (base Jukkoku-noboriguchi → Jukkokutōge-Sanroku, summit Jukkokutōge → Jukkokutōge-Sanchō), and the foot-of-the-hill rest house reopens as 'Mori no Eki Hakone Jukkoku-tōge'.
• 20234 December: with the closure of the Nose Electric Railway's Myōken-no-Mori Cable — the descendant of the line whose equipment had been transplanted to Jukkoku in 1956 — the Jikkoku Cable Line becomes the only remaining standard-gauge cable car in Japan.
• 2027Summer (planned): a replacement slope-car system is scheduled to open, with the cable car around seventy years old and spare parts increasingly hard to secure.