History
Kōka Station opened on 1 March 1904 as Ōhara Station on the Kansai Railway, between Tsuge and Fukagawa (today's Kōnan), in present-day Kōka, Shiga Prefecture. The line was nationalised on 1 October 1907 and assigned to the Kusatsu Line under the 1909 line-name standardisation. The station was renamed Ōharaichi on 1 May 1918 and finally Kōka on 10 April 1956. Freight handling ended on 1 October 1971 and parcels on 1 February 1984. It became part of West Japan Railway Company on 1 April 1987 at privatisation. A new elevated station building, modelled on a farmhouse storehouse and decorated with seven ninja-themed trompe-l'oeil paintings inside, opened on 5 November 2005, with a simple-contract operation arrangement starting 1 April 2006. ICOCA IC card service began on 17 March 2018.
History summarized from Japanese & English Wikipedia · last reviewed 2026-05-18.
Notes
The station building, opened in 2005, is shaped like a traditional farmhouse storehouse and the interior carries seven trompe-l'oeil paintings on ninja themes that nod to the surrounding Kōga region's ninja heritage.