Shinjuku Station (新宿駅) is run by East Japan Railway Company (JR East) and several other railway companies. It serves the Keio Line, Marunouchi Line, Saikyō Line, Yamanote Line, Chūō Line (Rapid), Chūō–Sōbu Line (Local), Odakyu Odawara Line (OH), Shōnan–Shinjuku Line, Ōedo Line, Shinjuku Line and Narita Express (N'EX). The station opened on 1 March 1885.
History
Shinjuku Station (新宿駅) opened on 1 March 1885 as a Nippon Railway station in Tsunohazu Village, Minamitoshima District, Tokyo Prefecture. Freight handling started on the same day. A Kobu Railway station opened on 11 April 1889. Station improvement work began in January 1904. In March 1906 the work was finished and the station building was moved to a site facing the Kōshū Kaidō. Kobu Railway electric trains used two platforms, about 350 m apart. Kobu Railway was nationalized on 1 October 1906, and Nippon Railway was nationalized on 1 November 1906. On 12 October 1909 the line became part of the Yamanote Line.
A station of the Keio Electric Railway opened above the Kōshū Kaidō on 1 May 1915. This company was the predecessor of Keio. On 28 November 1916 a fire broke out at the Shinjuku Train Depot, which was inside the station grounds. Work on station improvements started on 7 October 1919. The Great Kantō earthquake of 1 September 1923 severely damaged the station building. A new station building was finished on 26 April 1925, with underground passages for passengers and small freight. The old station building at the Kōshū Kaidō mouth was closed on 1 May 1926. Odakyu Electric Railway opened a station here on 1 April 1927.
On 1 May 1937 the Keio station was renamed from Yotsuya-Shinjuku Station to Keio Shinjuku Station. The station was damaged in an air raid on 25 May 1945. On 30 June 1950 automatic ticket gates began operating at the south exit. In October 1955, student groups were sent to the crowded Japanese National Railways platforms during rush hour to manage passengers. They were called 'pushers' because they pushed people into train cars. On 15 March 1959 a Teito Rapid Transit Authority station on the Marunouchi Line opened. On 8 February 1961 the Teito Rapid Transit Authority Ogikubo Line opened. That line is now the Marunouchi Line between Shinjuku and Ogikubo. On 7 December 1961 a fire completely destroyed the Japanese National Railways Kōshū-guchi station building, which later became the South Exit. The building was rebuilt on 20 December 1963. The Japanese National Railways east exit station building and its underground shopping street opened on 20 May 1964.
On 8 August 1967 an accident involving a US military fuel transport train led to 1,100 Japanese National Railways trains being cancelled. On 21 October 1968 the Shinjuku riot took place, and the student movement of Zengakuren became more active. On 28 June 1969 folk singers protested the Vietnam War at the West Exit. Up to 40,000 people gathered, but the police banned the assembly. On 21 October 1969 radical groups entered the tracks at Shinjuku Station. On 26 March 1970 the Toden, the Tokyo streetcar, was abolished, and streetcars disappeared from Shinjuku. On 24 April 1973 the Capital Region National Railway riot broke out, and damage including destruction and arson also happened inside the station. A former follower of Aum Shinrikyo, later renamed Aleph, carried it out.
On 10 March 1976 the Japanese National Railways south exit station building was rebuilt, and Shinjuku Luminous opened. On 17 November 1978 the east exit station building was renovated and renamed Shinjuku My City. It was later renamed Lumine Est Shinjuku. On 1 April 1987 Japanese National Railways was split up, and the station became a JR East station. On 19 March 1991 the Narita Express began operating. Its trains use platforms 3 and 4, and the platform numbers at the station were shifted as a result. On 18 November 2001 the Suica IC card became usable here. On 1 December 2001 the Shōnan–Shinjuku Line started stopping at the station. On 30 November 2019 direct services on the Sagami Railway line began. Most of these trains start and end at this station, and some run on the Saikyō Line toward Musashi-Urawa and Ōmiya. On 19 July 2020 the east-west free passage opened. On 1 March 2022 the Ekinaka Concierge (East Exit and Shin-minami) opened. On 2 October 2022 the main building of the Odakyu Department Store Shinjuku Store closed. JR East plans to start using slit-frame platform doors on tracks 13 and 16 within 2026. The Ekinaka Concierge East Exit is scheduled to close on 31 July 2026.
See all 116 dated events in the Data view →
Written by an AI from this station's own sourced facts (the dated events in the Data view), nothing else, and checked by a program for dates and numbers that are not in those facts. It can still be wrong. Found a mistake? . Adapted from Japanese Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0; this text is shared under the same licence.