History
Okinashima Station opened on 15 July 1899 as a general station on the privately built Iwaetsu Railway, becoming a state-operated stop with the 1 November 1906 nationalization. The original name reflected the location in then-Okinashima Village, itself named for Oki Island in Lake Inawashiro. Located in the town of Inawashiro in Fukushima Prefecture on what is now JR East's Ban'etsu West Line, the station has two opposed side platforms linked by a level crossing. Freight ended in 1963, parcels in 1972, and the station was unstaffed in 1983 alongside Ban'etsu West Line CTC. JR East took over on 1 April 1987.
History summarized from Japanese & English Wikipedia · last reviewed 2026-06-09.
Notes
Okinashima was the nearest station to the imperial Arisugawa and Takamatsu princely villas on Lake Inawashiro — today the Tenkyōkaku villa and the Fukushima Prefectural Guest House — and the old depot kept a dedicated reception room for distinguished visitors; the historic depot was later named to the Japan Society of Civil Engineers' selected heritage list as part of the Ban'etsu West Line group in 2016.