History
Kuji Station opened on 1930-03-27 as a station on the Japanese Government Railways Hachinohe Line, in the city of Kuji on the Iwate coast. It became the terminus of the JNR Kuji Line on 1975-07-20; that line was spun off to the third-sector Sanriku Railway as the Kita-Rias Line on 1984-04-01. JR East took over the JNR portion at the 1987-04-01 privatisation. The 2011-03-11 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami suspended both lines; Sanriku Railway resumed service to Rikuchū-Noda within five days and to Tanohata by 2012-04-01, and Hachinohe Line trains restarted on 2012-03-17. On 2019-03-23 the Kita-Rias Line was merged into the new Sanriku Railway Rias Line, of which Kuji became the northern terminus.
History summarized from Japanese & English Wikipedia · last reviewed 2026-06-09.
Where the English and Japanese sources differ, this account follows the Japanese source.
Notes
The Sanriku Railway side of the station served as 'Kita-Sanriku Station' on NHK's morning serial drama Amachan, broadcast from April to September 2013, and the platform's nickname kohaku-iro (amber colour) honours Kuji's status as Japan's leading amber-producing area.