#kyu shirataki station

[redsamuraiii]

Waiting For You by yukiii_fleur

Photo reminds me of a story in Hokkaido where a high school girl is the only passenger boarding the train everyday to school and back home. 

Ridership at the Kyu-Shirataki station and a few neighbouring ones had fallen because of the remote location. But students still depend on the train and parents asked the company keep the station open for their children.

Japan’s efficient high-speed rails have continued to expand to the outskirts of the country, rendering many of Japan’s older, low-tech railways obsolete. 

But if this story of a young girl and her special connection to the Kyu-Shirataki station is any indicator, Japan’s disappearing rural railroads will be remembered for their service to even the most remote parts of the country.

Source : bloomberg.com

[introverted-yuni-inu]

one day, i wish to visit the Kyu-Shirataki train station in Hokkaido; Japan

[totally-addicted-to-twice]

So I really hate to be the ‘this isn’t 100% factual!’ person but I guess I have to be cause no one on this website knows how to fact-check apparently.

First of all, the actual train station was the Kyu-Shirataki station, not the Kami-Shirataki. (Which the original article linked in the OP did update at some point to correct after misidentifying it)

Second off, according to this article from The Straits Times, quoting a report from Taiwan Apple Daily, states that the girl and ten of her classmates took the train from Kyu-Shirataki in the morning and they have three trains they can choose to take home. So it wasn’t a single high schooler riding the train, it was eleven people.

Also there’s zero evidence that the closing of the Kyu-Shirataki station was timed to occur after her graduation, it was very likely a coincidence considering that JR Hokkaido is a state-owned entity and the Japanese fiscal year for the government ends on 31 March. So yeah no shit they’d close it down in March.

‘For years, there’s only been one passenger waiting at the Kami-Shirataki train station in the northernmost island of Hokkaido, Japan: A high-school girl, on her way to class. The train stops there only twice a day—once to pick up the girl and again to drop her off after the school day is over.It sounds like a Hayao Miyazaki film. But according to CCTV News, it was a decision that Japan Railways—the group that operates the country’s railway network—made more than three years ago. At that time, ridership at the Kami-Shirataki station had dramatically fallen because of its remote location, and freight service had ended there as well. Japan Railways was getting ready to shut the station down for good—until they noticed that it was still being used every day by the high-schooler. So they decided to keep the station open for her until she graduates. The company’s even adjusted the train’s timetable according to the girl’s schedule. The unnamed girl is expected to graduate this March, which is when the station will finally be closed.’

[redsamuraiii]

Kyu-shirataki Train Station in Hokkaido

The train station that stayed open for one schoolgirl.

The story of a defunct train station in Hokkaido, Japan, that stayed open so that its sole patron—a teenage girl—could commute to school has come to a bittersweet end: Eighteen-year-old Kana Harada graduated from high school last Friday, March 25, and the Kyu-shirataki station—where she boarded a train every morning to travel to school, about 35 minutes away—has finally closed.

"I got on and off this train for the last three years, and this station's presence has become something I have taken for granted," Harada told Reuters in January. "I do feel sad to think it will disappear." Over this time, trains have serviced the Kyu-shirataki station just once per morning, to pick up Harada, and a few times in the afternoon to drop off passengers. 

Now I’m patiently waiting for someone to do a Studio Ghibli style of anime about the story of this girl since she first boards the train for the first time in her childhood days and her last time boarding it in her teenage years. All the people she came across throughout her daily journey to and back from school, perhaps her relationship with an unlikely regular passenger, like ‘Whisper of the Heart’.  

[megalofasz]

On the island of Hokkaido, the Kyu-shirataki train station’s last remaining patron—a student—has graduated from high school.

Original story: Japan Keeps This Train Station Running for Just One Regular Passenger

Trains here make only a few stops—when a lone high-school student leaves for school, and when class is over.