History
Ono Station opened on 11 June 1906 as a passenger and freight station of the Imperial Railway Agency's Chūō Main Line, when the Okaya - Shiojiri section was completed. It sits in the town of Tatsuno, Kamiina District, Nagano Prefecture, on what is now the Tatsuno branch of the Chūō Main Line. Freight handling ended on 31 October 1982, parcel handling on 1 February 1984, and the station became a contracted station on 21 March 1984. With JNR's breakup on 1 April 1987 it became a JR East station. The fare rule for trips to Tokyo changed on 13 March 2010 (different via Shiojiri vs. via Tatsuno) and the station was incorporated into the Tokyo Metropolitan Area on 1 April 2014, though Suica IC cards can only be used to transit through this section, not to enter or exit at Ono. Management of the station was transferred to Shiojiri on 1 September 2018.
History summarized from Japanese & English Wikipedia · last reviewed 2026-05-22.
Notes
The area around Ono Station was the old Ono-juku post town, where the Sanshū Kaidō and (in the early Edo period) the Nakasendō once crossed; pass routes north and south were so steep that the Nakasendō was later rerouted via Shiojiri, leaving Ono as a quieter station on what eventually became the Tatsuno branch line.