History
Akabuchi Station is a JR East stop on the Tazawako Line in Shizukuishi, Iwate Prefecture, 22.0 rail kilometres from the line's terminus at Morioka. The route here has a complicated lineage: from 1922 until 1944 the Hashiba Line ran from Shizukuishi via the area now containing Akabuchi to Hashiba Station, with no intermediate stops; that section was suspended as a non-essential wartime line in 1944 and the rails removed. Postwar planning rerouted the extension and located Akabuchi at the branching point of the new route; the station opened on 10 September 1964 as the terminus of the Hashiba Line. It became an intermediate stop on 20 October 1966 when the Sengan-Pass section through to Tazawako opened and the route was renamed the Tazawako Line, and joined JR East on 1 April 1987.
History summarized from Japanese & English Wikipedia · last reviewed 2026-05-18.
Notes
Akabuchi is the dividing point between JR East's Morioka and Akita branch jurisdictions, and although Akita Shinkansen "Komachi" services pass through without stopping, they often make operational halts here for train-meets in the single-track Sengan-Pass section.