History
Gion-bashi opened on 1 August 1924 as a Kumamoto City tram stop. It was abolished at an unrecorded date and reopened in May 1948. The stop is stop 4 on the Trunk Line, served by the A-system. Until the line's March 2011 nomenclature reform, the kanji used for "Gi" was inconsistent across the operator's own signage: the in-car fare display used 祗 (with 示+氐 radicals), the route diagram used 祇 (with ネ+氏 radicals), and the stop name board carried both 祇 (ネ+氏) and 祇 (示+氏).
History summarized from Japanese & English Wikipedia · last reviewed 2026-05-25.
Notes
The Gion-bashi (Gion Bridge) the stop is named for is said to have been built across the Tsuboi River in 1902 for the Meiji Emperor's visit to Kumamoto, with the "Gion" name itself coming from the Gion festival held at the nearby Kitaoka Shrine.