Horonai line

Horonai line
Freight Train on the Horonai Line (August 1983)
Route length:	18.1 km + 3.6 km
Gauge :	1067 mm ( cape track )
Dual track :	No
Legend ↑ Hakodate main line 1882– ← Muroran main line 1892– 0.0 Iwamizawa ( 岩 見 沢 ) 1884– → Hakodate main line 1891– 4.0 Sakaemachi ( 栄 町 ) 1980-1987 6.3 Kayano ( 萱 野 ) 1913-1987 10.9 0.0 * Mikasa ( 三 笠 ) 1882-1987 1.2 * Horonai Sumiyoshi ( 幌 内 住 吉 ) 1950-1972 2.7 * Horonai ( 幌 内 ) 1898-1987 Horonai ( 幌 内 ) 1882-1898 3.6 * Horonai coal mine 1898-1987 Shin Mikasa coal mine 1932-1973 14.8 Tōmatsu ( 唐松 ) 1929-1987 Ikushumbetsu-gawa 16.8 Yayoi ( 弥 生 ) 1948-1987 Yayoi coal mine 1916-1960 ← Mikasa Forest Railway 1938-1955 Sumitomo coal mine 1906-1971 18.1 Ikushumbetsu ( 幾 春 別 ) 1888-1987 Kitasumi coal mine 1888-1957

The Horonai Line ( Japanese 幌 内線 , Horonai-sen ) was a railway line in the center of the Japanese island of Hokkaidō . It was opened between 1882 and 1888 and was in operation until 1987.

description

The Horonai Line, located in the sub-prefecture of Sorachi , consisted of a 18.1 km long main line and a 3.6 km long branch line. The former led from Iwamizawa through the valley of Ikushumbetsu-gawa to Ikushumbetsu station . The latter began in Mikasa, negotiated a hairpin there and led into a side valley to the Horonai train station and the Horonai coal mine. Both parts of the route were cape -lane, single-track and not electrified. A total of nine train stations and stops were developed. There were also several sidings to coal mines.

Horonai station is now used as a railway museum.

history

Originally, the Horonai Line was a section of the first railway line on Hokkaidō, which began in the port of Temiya near Otaru . It was built by the state railway company Kan'ei Horonai Tetsudō , mainly to develop the extensive hard coal deposits in the Horonai coal field northeast of Sapporo . The construction management was held by the American engineer Joseph U. Crawford, who had been hired by the Japanese government as a “ foreign contractor ”.

After the line had reached Ebetsu on June 25, 1882 , the section via Mikasa to the coal mine at Horonai was opened on November 13 of the same year . Initially, the mining of coal had priority, so that passenger traffic did not begin until February 2, 1883. The actual starting point of the route described, Iwamizawa station , did not go into operation until August 15, 1884.

On December 10, 1888, the route branch from Mikasa to Ikushumbetsu was put into operation . With the privatization of Kan'ei Horonai Tetsudō, the line went into the possession of the private mining and railway company Hokkaidō Tankō Tetsudō on December 11, 1889 . On October 1, 1906, the company had to sell its route network to the state as a result of the Railway Nationalization Act passed by parliament . The Railway Authority (later the Ministry of Railways ) gave the route from Iwamizawa to Horonai or Ikushumbetsu on October 12, 1909 the official name of the Horonai Line.

The gradual decline of coal mining from the 1960s onwards led to a steadily decreasing capacity utilization. On October 1, 1972, the Japanese State Railways (JNR) stopped passenger traffic on the Mikasa – Horonai branch, and on May 25, 1981, freight traffic on the Mikasa – Ikushumbetsu branch. Although the Horonai line was noted in the JNR redevelopment concept published in 1984 as a line to be closed, it remained in existence after the state railway privatization carried out on April 1, 1987 - if only for a few months. JR Freight operated the freight traffic from Iwamizawa to Horonai until June 19, 1987, while JR Hokkaido stopped the passenger traffic between Iwamizawa and Ikushumbetsu on July 13, 1987 and transferred it to the bus company Hokkaidō Chūō Bus .

List of train stations

Surname	km	Connecting lines	location	place
Main line
Iwamizawa ( 岩 見 沢 )	00.0	Hakodate Main Line Muroran Main Line	Coord.	Iwamizawa
Sakaemachi ( 栄 町 )	04.0		Coord.
Kayano ( 萱 野 )	06.3		Coord.	Mikasa
Mikasa ( 三 笠 )	10.9		Coord.
Tōmatsu ( 唐松 )	14.8		Coord.
Yayoi ( 弥 生 )	16.8		Coord.
Ikushumbetsu ( 幾 春 別 )	18.1		Coord.
Branch line
Mikasa ( 三 笠 )	00.0			Mikasa
Horonai Sumiyoshi ( 幌 内 住 吉 )	01.2		Coord.
Horonai ( 幌 内 )	02.7		Coord.

Web links

Commons : Horonai line  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Photos of the former railway line

Individual evidence

1. ^ Yoshimitsu Takanashi: Help from across the seas. (PDF, 334 kB) EC Pro, 2017, accessed on November 15, 2017 (English). 
2. ↑ ^{a b} JNR General Directorate Hokkaidō (Ed.): 北海道 鉄 道 百年 史 (100 years of Hokkaidō railway history). Sapporo 1980.
3. ↑ 最後 の 石炭 列車 涙 振 り 切 り 走 る 幌 内線, Hokkaidō Shimbun, June 20, 1987.
4. ↑ Keisuke Imao: 日本 鉄 道 旅行 地 図 帳 (Japan Rail Travel Atlas ) . tape 1 Hokkaidō. Shinchosha, Tokyo 2008, ISBN 978-4-10-790019-7 , pp. 36 .

 Map with all coordinates: OSM | WikiMap