2002: A Passenger Railway Station, Complete with a Memorable Mascot, is Opened in Japan

July 1, 2002

On Japan’s island of Shikoku, a passenger railway station was opened in the town of Kagami in Kōchi Prefecture. (In 2006, Kagami became part of the newly formed city of Kōnan; however, the name of the station has remained the same.) Kagami Station is located on the 26.5-mile (42.7-kilometer)-long Asa Line of the Tosa Kuroshio Railway.   

Kagami Station serves a single elevated track. There is no building at this station, but an enclosed shelter was built on the platform for passengers. In addition, there is a bicycle shed beneath that elevated structure.  

A unique component of all of the stations on the Asa Line is that they each display cartoon mascot characters that were designed by Takashi Yanase (1919-2013), a prolific illustrator and writer who had been a longtime resident of Kōchi Prefecture. The character created by Yanase that is featured at Kagami Station is a figure named Kagami Mikan-chan, whose head is a mandarin orange. (An image of this mascot can be seen in the accompanying photo of the station’s platform.) This design for Kagami Station was selected because a type of mandarin orange known as Yamkita Mikan is a specialty product in that region of Japan.

Photo Credit: Public Domain

For more information on Kagami Station, please check out  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kagami_Station

Additional information on the Asa Line is available at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tosa_Kuroshio_Railway_Asa_Line