is a 11.2 km

railway line Rail terminology is a form of technical terminology. The difference between the American term ''railroad'' and the international term ''railway'' (used by the International Union of Railways and English-speaking countries outside the United Sta ...

owned by the

Mizushima Rinkai Railway The is a third-sector railway company based in Kurashiki, Okayama, Japan. The company took over operation of three former Kurashiki City Transportation Bureau lines in 1970. It mainly transports freight for the industrial area around the Port o ...

, serving

Kurashiki is a historic city located in western Okayama Prefecture, Japan, sitting on the Takahashi River, on the coast of the Inland Sea. As of March 31, 2017, the city has an estimated population of 483,576 and a population density of 1,400 persons per ...

Okayama Prefecture is a Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located in the Chūgoku region of Honshu. Okayama Prefecture has a population of 1,906,464 (1 February 2018) and has a geographic area of 7,114 Square kilometre, km2 (2,746 sq mi). Okayama Prefectur ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

. The line branches southward from the

San'yō Main Line The is a major railway line owned by JR Group companies in western Japan, connecting Kōbe Station and Moji Station, largely paralleling the coast of the Seto Inland Sea, Inland Sea, in other words, the southern coast of western Honshu. The Sa ...

, owned by

JR West , also referred to as , is one of the Japan Railways Group (JR Group) companies and operates in western Honshu. It has its headquarters in Kita-ku, Osaka. It is listed in the Tokyo Stock Exchange, is a constituent of the TOPIX Large70 index, and ...

, at

Kurashiki-shi Station is a train station in the city of Kurashiki, Okayama Prefecture, Japan. It is on the Mizushima Main Line, operated by Mizushima Rinkai Railway. This is the only staffed station on the line. The station is located close to Kurashiki Station o ...

, ending in the industrial district of Mizushima. Originally an

industrial railway An industrial railway is a type of railway (usually private) that is not available for public transportation and is used exclusively to serve a particular industrial, logistics, or military site. In regions of the world influenced by British ra ...

for the military in Mizushima, passenger services began in 1948. The line switched hands three times before being owned and operated by the Mizushima Rinkai Railway.

Operations

The line is not

electrified Electrification is the process of powering by electricity and, in many contexts, the introduction of such power by changing over from an earlier power source. The broad meaning of the term, such as in the history of technology, economic history ...

and is single-tracked for the entire line, with passing loops at Nishitomii,

Yayoi The started at the beginning of the Neolithic in Japan, continued through the Bronze Age, and towards its end crossed into the Iron Age. Since the 1980s, scholars have argued that a period previously classified as a transition from the Jōmon p ...

, and Mizushima stations. Passenger rail services begin at Kurashiki-shi and terminate in Mizushima, except during rush hour and a few during the day, when it terminates in Mitsubishi-jikō-mae. Trains arrive roughly every 20 minutes.

Stations

References

{{Mizushima Rinkai Railway Main Line Mizushima Rinkai Railway Mizushima Main Line Railway lines in Japan Rail transport in Okayama Prefecture Railway lines opened in 1943 Japanese third-sector railway lines