Aihara

History

Aihara Station opened on 23 September 1908 with the inauguration of the Yokohama Railway between Higashi-Kanagawa and Hachiōji, and sits in the city of Machida, Tokyo, on the modern Yokohama Line. The Railway Bureau leased the line in April 1910 before nationalising it on 1 October 1917. Freight handling ceased in November 1958 and parcel handling in April 1959. With the breakup of Japanese National Railways on 1 April 1987, the stop passed to JR East. The current overhead concourse opened on 1 June 2003 atop two side platforms, the Midori no Madoguchi closed in February 2010, station numbering as JH29 began on 20 August 2016, and smart platform doors entered service on 26 November 2025.

History summarized from Japanese & English Wikipedia · last reviewed 2026-06-09.

Notes

When the line opened, the railway expected Aihara to serve Hashimoto too — so Hashimoto Station was not originally planned. Local residents lobbied and donated land for it, leaving the two stops just 1.9 km apart, an unusually short interval for the era.