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The story
Kanagawa Prefecture has effectively shelved its plan to build, as a standalone first-phase project, just the roughly 3km stretch of the Sotetsu Izumino Line from Shonandai to the area near Keio University’s Shonan Fujisawa Campus (SFC), and will instead reconsider the entire roughly 8km line all the way to its terminus at Kuramino. The reversal comes down to the difficulty of securing profitability, effectively sending back to square one a plan that had been laid out in the 2016 Council for Transport Policy report. On the 5ch thread, discussion centered less on the rail plan itself and more on side topics: the push to attract a new Tokaido Shinkansen station to the Kuramino area at the line’s endpoint, and debates over SFC’s reputation and its AO (admissions-office) entrance exam system.
Kanagawa Prefecture has announced it will move forward studying the extension of the Sotetsu Izumino Line across the entire Shonandai–Kuramino section. Until now, the stretch from Shonandai to the area near Keio University’s Shonan Fujisawa Campus (SFC) had been designated the first-phase section, but since profitability could not be secured there, the study area is being expanded to cover the full line through to Kuramino.
The Sotetsu Izumino Line extension plan calls for connecting the current terminus, Shonandai Station, to the Kuramino district of Samukawa Town — home to JR Sagami Line’s Kuramino Station — a distance of roughly 8km. It was also included in the 2016 Council for Transport Policy report.
Kanagawa Prefecture had, until now, been studying the roughly 3km stretch to the area near Keio University’s SFC — where a certain level of ridership could be expected — as the first-phase section, with plans for a Station A near Akihadai Park in Fujisawa City and a Station B near SFC. The remaining roughly 5km on to the Kuramino district had been designated the second-phase section.
Source: tabiris.com / original article here
What people said
SFC students all commute by car, right?
Sorry, driving was too much hassle for me — I just took a taxi from home every time.
What's actually surprising is that the university provides parking for students at all.
The head of the government's Tax Commission — always going on about raising taxes — is nothing but Keio professors and alumni.
Maybe it's because they just say "Keio" over and over to hide it? That gym-membership card fraud case recently was SFC too.
Back when TRON creator Ken Sakamura was still an active professor there, I feel like SFC had a lot more name recognition.
SFC = Ken Sakamura, that was pretty much the image.
Lol, got a little chuckle out of that.
I'm literally in Kita-Ayase right now, got a problem with that?
It might be fine in 10 years, but who knows about 20 or 30 years out
SFC itself is already 30-some years old
Aoyama Gakuin's Atsugi campus disappeared too, and Chuo University's heading back to central Tokyo as well
You really can't count on universities going forward.
Basing city planning and infrastructure development on something like that is something they should absolutely avoid.
True.
Super-low birthrates are pretty much locked in from here, no need to fuss over some relic from the bubble era like that.
The Ministry of Finance's policy is to drastically cut bloated university enrollment quotas given the shrinking, aging population — phasing out "F-rank" (bottom-tier) schools and departments one after another that can't stay solvent without international students.
They're also working to curb the university enrollment rate itself, to weed out students who barely study and narrow down who actually goes to college.
Honestly, that's a surprisingly good policy coming from the Finance Ministry.
> Efforts are underway in the Kuramino area to attract a new Tokaido Shinkansen station
So we're getting yet another Kodama-only stop, huh.
Originally there was supposed to be one more too — Minami-Biwako Station.
Given scheduling constraints, I have a feeling every train would end up stopping there, same as Shin-Yokohama.
[2026 Latest] Where students admitted to both Waseda and Keio actually choose to enroll
https://www.toshin.com/news_release/uploadFiles/NewsReleases/850bcbaf0ad489ece16e4f586e71afaf24a8d4cbc9c26d1b9c4be1fbda766baa20260925125643.pdf
○Waseda Poli-Sci/Econ 100 – 0 Keio Law●
○Waseda Poli-Sci/Econ 90.0 – 10.0 Keio Econ●
○Waseda Law 73.3 – 26.7 Keio Law●
○Waseda Commerce 83.3 – 16.7 Keio Commerce●
○Waseda Letters 60.0 – 40.0 Keio Letters●
○Waseda Culture/Media/Society 62.5 – 37.5 Keio Letters●
○Waseda Fundamental Sci & Eng 66.7 – 33.3 Keio Sci & Eng●
○Waseda Creative Sci & Eng 81.8 – 18.2 Keio Sci & Eng●
○Waseda Advanced Sci & Eng 71.4 – 28.6 Keio Sci & Eng●
Waseda wins 9 — Keio wins 0
Overall enrollment-choice rate among students admitted to both in matching fields
Waseda 75.7% — Keio 24.3%
Compare the med schools instead!
Looking at the map, yeah, but JR probably doesn't want to foot the bill.
And it's pointless if the Nozomi doesn't stop there anyway.
Apparently the Samukawa branch line still even exists.
Kanagawa Prefecture Tokaido Shinkansen New Station Promotion Association
Members: Kanagawa Prefecture, Sagamihara City, Hiratsuka City, Fujisawa City, Chigasaki City, Atsugi City, Isehara City, Ebina City, Zama City, Ayase City, Samukawa Town, the Kanagawa Association of Mayors, the Kanagawa Association of Towns and Villages, the Kanagawa Federation of Chambers of Commerce and Industry, and the Kanagawa Federation of Societies of Commerce and Industry
It's not just Samukawa Town pushing for this alone.
They probably haven't agreed on whether to build it on the east or west side of the Sagami River.
The location's already decided, including the scope of redevelopment.
Building it on the east side is settled. If they built it on the west, you wouldn't be able to walk to the Sagami Line's Kuramino Station.
I have no idea where this even is.
You might have at least heard of the New Year's visit (hatsumode) to Samukawa Shrine.
Of course not.
Kuramino Station is an unstaffed stop with under 2,000 boardings a day.
It's got no name recognition even within Kanagawa.
Background and Key Points of This Story
The Sotetsu Izumino Line extension is a plan that was included in the 2016 Council for Transport Policy report. The prefecture had positioned the stretch up to near Keio SFC — where profitability seemed easier to secure — as the first phase, with the remaining section to Kuramino designated the second phase. This policy shift comes because officials judged that the first-phase section alone couldn’t be made to pay for itself on its own; it doesn’t mean the SFC extension has been scrapped outright, but rather that the plan is being reorganized to study the full roughly 8km to Kuramino as one unified project instead of splitting it into phases. This is the point readers most easily get wrong: the accurate framing isn’t “SFC extension canceled” but “first-phase construction called off.” In the thread, discussion centered less on the rail line’s own profitability and more on side topics — the push to attract a new Tokaido Shinkansen station to the Kuramino area at the extension’s endpoint, and debates over SFC’s reputation and its AO admissions system. The concrete figure that Kuramino Station sees under 2,000 boardings a day at an unstaffed station is also a useful reference point for gauging the scale of the extension plan.
*This article is compiled and summarized from the 5ch (News Express+) thread “[Kanagawa] Sotetsu Izumino Line effectively scraps early opening to Keio SFC, to be reconsidered as full-line construction to Kuramino.”
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