Jōban Line

Tokyo to Sendai up the Pacific coast, inland of the Shinkansen: complete on 1 April 1905, and reopened right through Fukushima in March 2020 after nine years shut.

The Jōban Line officially runs from Nippori in Tokyo to Iwanuma in Miyagi, but since the Ueno–Tokyo Line opened its trains start at Shinagawa or Ueno and carry on past Iwanuma over Tōhoku Main Line rails into Sendai. The name comes from the old provinces of Jōshū and Banshū, which it strings together on the way to Tokyo, and the route follows the Pacific coast through Chiba, Ibaraki and Fukushima. The section between Tomioka and Namie runs through the exclusion zone around the Fukushima Daiichi meltdown and was shut after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami; it reopened on 14 March 2020, nine years without a train.

Stations

1. 0 kmUeno +4
2. 2 kmNippori
3. 3 kmMikawashima
4. 5 kmMinami-Senju
5. 7 kmKita-Senju
6. 18 kmMatsudo
7. Show 66 more stations

   1. 29 kmKashiwa
   2. 33 kmAbiko
   3. 36 kmTennodai
   4. 40 kmToride
   5. 45 kmFujishiro
   6. 48 kmRyugasakishi
   7. 53 kmUshiku
   8. 57 kmHitachino-Ushiku
   9. 59 kmArakawaoki
   10. 66 kmTsuchiura
   11. 72 kmKandatsu
   12. 78 kmTakahama
   13. 82 kmIshioka
   14. 88 kmHatori
   15. 94 kmIwama
   16. 101 kmTomobe
   17. 106 kmUchihara
   18. 111 kmAkatsuka
   19. 115 kmKairakuen
   20. 117 kmMito
   21. 123 kmKatsuta
   22. 127 kmSawa
   23. 132 kmTokai
   24. 139 kmOmika
   25. 144 kmHitachi-Taga
   26. 149 kmHitachi
   27. 154 kmOgitsu
   28. 159 kmJuo
   29. 165 kmTakahagi
   30. 169 kmMinami-Nakago
   31. 174 kmIsohara
   32. 181 kmOtsuko
   33. 185 kmNakoso
   34. 190 kmUeda
   35. 197 kmIzumi
   36. 203 kmYumoto
   37. 207 kmUchigo
   38. 211 kmIwaki
   39. 217 kmKusano
   40. 221 kmYotsukura
   41. 226 kmHisanohama
   42. 230 kmSuetsugi
   43. 234 kmHirono
   44. 240 kmKido
   45. 243 kmTatsuta
   46. 250 kmTomioka
   47. 255 kmYonomori
   48. 260 kmOno
   49. 266 kmFutaba
   50. 270 kmNamie
   51. 275 kmMomouchi
   52. 279 kmOdaka
   53. 284 kmIwaki-Ota
   54. 289 kmHaranomachi
   55. 296 kmKashima
   56. 303 kmNittaki
   57. 309 kmSoma
   58. 313 kmKomagamine
   59. 317 kmShinchi
   60. 323 kmSakamoto
   61. 328 kmYamashita
   62. 332 kmHamayoshida
   63. 337 kmWatari
   64. 340 kmOkuma
   65. 345 kmIwanuma
   66. 349 kmTatekoshi
8. 353 kmNatori
9. 355 kmMinami-Sendai
10. 358 kmTaishido
11. 359 kmNagamachi
12. 363 kmSendai +2

The stations OpenStreetMap lists for this service, in order, with the distance along the line as drawn here. A train may skip some of them. A +N after a station: N other routes on this map stop or end there, and the map draws it as a station where lines meet.

Along the way

• Ueno
• The Pacific coast of Ibaraki
• Tomioka
• The Fukushima Daiichi exclusion zone
• Namie
• Iwanuma, onto the Tōhoku Main Line

How this line was checked

• Line drawn from OpenStreetMap relation 8506269: the same nodes OpenStreetMap holds for this railway, thinned to within under 25 m of them
• Checked against OpenStreetMap: the whole line lies on real track, a median 7 m from it
• The operator publishes this line's timetable: JR East, a place to look it up, not a check of our drawing
• Wikipedia has an article for this line

Questions and answers

How long is the Jōban Line?

The Jōban Line runs 364 km from Tokyo to Sendai.

How long does the Jōban Line take?

The fastest scheduled journey is ≈ 4 h 40 min for the 364 km. That is an average of 78 km/h end to end.

Who runs the Jōban Line?

JR East, with Limited Express Hitachi.

How old is the Jōban Line?

The line has been in service since 1905. That is the year the atlas dates it from: for a modern brand running over an older railway, it is the railway's date, not the brand's.

View on the world railway map →

Read more on Wikipedia ↗