History
Nishijō Station opened on 1 November 1900 as the temporary terminus of the government-operated Shinonoi Line, becoming an intermediate stop the following year when the line was extended to Matsumoto. Freight handling ended in December 1971, and the station became an unstaffed simple-contract station in March 1985. It passed to JR East with the privatisation of JNR on 1 April 1987. In September 1988 the alignment between Akashina and Nishijō was rerouted, eliminating the former Shiozawa signal stop. The line received station-numbering codes in February 2025 (with Nishijō becoming SN09), and Suica IC card service began on 15 March 2025.
History summarized from Japanese & English Wikipedia · last reviewed 2026-05-18.
Notes
Because Japan has another Saijō Station in Hiroshima Prefecture, tickets issued from this Nagano station carry the prefix "（篠）" ("Shinonoi") to distinguish the two homophones.