Celebratory events at Nagasaki Station in Nagasaki Prefecture marked the opening of the Nishi-Kyushu Shinkansen Line on Sept. 23. (The Asahi Shimbun)

Photo/Illutration Tetsuya Yamaguchi, right, station manager of Isahaya Station in Nagasaki Prefecture, joined by Olympic gymnist Kohei Uchimura, gives the signal for the departure of the new Nishi-Kyushu Shinkansen on Sept. 23. (Pool)

Despite various unresolved problems, celebratory events were held Sept. 23 to mark the opening of the Nishi-Kyushu Shinkansen Line, the shortest bullet train line in Japan.

The 66-kilometer route, operated by Kyushu Railway Co. (JR Kyushu), connects Takeo-Onsen Station in Takeo, Saga Prefecture, and Nagasaki Station in Nagasaki Prefecture.

The service cuts the train travel time between Hakata Station in Fukuoka Prefecture and Nagasaki Station by 30 minutes to 80 minutes.

At 6:17 a.m. on Sept. 23, the first Nishi-Kyushu Shinkansen, named Kamome No. 2, a N700S series bullet train, left Nagasaki Station with all reserved seats taken.

Three hours earlier, at around 3:30 a.m., train fans had already formed a 200-meter line at the west exit of the station to board the train.

Teruhiko Kashino, 55, who was standing at the front of the queue, had traveled by bus for 15 hours from his home in Yokohama to Hakata. He started lining up at 3 a.m.

At 5 a.m., an opening ceremony for the new line was held at the station. Neru Nagahama, an actress and a former member of a girl idol group Keyakizaka 46, now called Sakurazaka 46, joined the celebration.

Just after 6 a.m. the enthusiastic passengers, most of them carrying smartphones and cameras, boarded the Kamome No. 2, and the red-and-white-colored train smoothly departed the platform.

A departure ceremony was also held around 5:30 a.m. at the newly built Ureshino-Onsen Station in Saga Prefecture, joined by Reina Matsui, an actress known as a Shinkansen fan.

The first Nishi-Kyushu Shinkansen running in the opposite direction was the Kamome No. 1, which left Takeo-Onsen Station at 7:03 a.m.

A total of 44 Shinkansen will connect Takeo-Onsen Station and Nagasaki Station daily. If the trains run at the maximum speed, the journey will take only 23 minutes.

The service will make stops at Shin-Omura Station and Isahaya Station in Nagasaki Prefecture, in addition to Ureshino-Onsen Station.

Local authorities and businesses in the Kyushu region are banking on the new Shinkansen line to bring in more tourists and lead to an economic recovery.

“Tourism in the Kyushu region has had a hard time with various events being canceled during the pandemic,” an official at travel agency JTB Corp. said. “The opening of the Shinkansen, even on a short route, will stimulate demand for travel.”

Planning for the new Shinkansen line has not been smooth.

Construction costs have reached 619.7 billion yen ($4.36 billion), more than 20 percent higher than the initial estimate of 500 billion yen in 2012, when the project was officially approved.

A plan was also floated to use gauge-changeable carriages that would enable the bullet trains to run on narrower conventional tracks, including a 50-km section in Saga Prefecture.

But that plan was scrapped, upsetting the governor and businesses in Saga Prefecture.

Observers also said it is unclear when the Nishi-Kyushu Shinkansen Line will be connected to the existing Kagoshima route on the Kyushu Shinkansen Line.

(This article was compiled from reports by Hironori Kato, Tetsuya Ishikura, Satoshi Juyanagi, Motoki Nagasawa, Mami Okada and Emika Terashima.)

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