Ginzan

History

Ginzan Station opened on 1905-01-29 as a general station of the private Hokkaido Railway, passed to the national network on 1907-07-01 with the line's nationalisation, and was absorbed into the Hakodate Main Line on 1909-10-12. Around 1913 a horse-drawn tramway and a rope conveyor were built to bring ore from the Meiji Mine in Akaigawa down to the station for transhipment to the Kunitomi smelter. Freight handling ended on 1972-03-15, and parcels on 1982-03-01, when the station was unstaffed. The passing loop was removed on 1986-11-01 but reinstated on 1988-11-03 using the former down track and platform. JR Hokkaido took over at the 1987-04-01 privatisation. In April 2004 the platforms were lengthened, removing the need for door-cutting on regular trains.

History summarized from Japanese & English Wikipedia · last reviewed 2026-05-18.

Notes

The station building featured in the 1970 Tora-san film 'Otoko wa Tsurai yo: Bōkyō-hen'; today the only JR Hokkaido station with off-premises ticket commissioning sells its tickets at a shop a few minutes' walk away.