Hamacho Station
S10 · Shinjuku Line · Chuo
Hamacho Station (浜町)
Hamacho sits under Hamacho Park, and getting a ten-car platform into that space took some ingenuity. The open-cut section beneath the park gave only 157.5 m of the 210 m needed, so engineers drove two single-track shield tunnels through and then opened out the ground between them over a length of 62.5 m, jacking steel pipes horizontally above the gap to hold the earth while they dug – a spectacle-shaped station, as the technique is called in Japanese. Twenty buildings overhead had to be underpinned or have their ground chemically stabilized first. While that work was going on in 1976, a Naumann elephant fossil turned up nearby and was catalogued as the Hamacho specimen.
The station opened on 21 December 1978 as S10, with its island platform on a curve of 510 m radius three levels down and the ticket gates on the first basement. It is the quietest stop on the Shinjuku Line: 21,447 entries and exits a day in 2024, less than half the figure at Bakuro-yokoyama or Morishita on either side, both of which are express stops. Its unofficial second name, Meijiza-mae, survives in the on-board announcements.
Finding Hamacho on the signs
Every line gives the station its own letter-and-number code. You never have to read the Japanese name to find the right platform.
Station numbers at Hamacho
Tokyo signposts every platform, exit and train door with a letter and a two-digit number. Matching the number is faster than reading the name — and it is what you will see on the map, in announcements and on the platform edge.
First and last trains at Hamacho
| Line and direction | Weekdays first – last | Saturdays, Sundays & holidays first – last |
|---|---|---|
| SShinjukuS10 towards Motoyawata | 05:17 – 00:17 to Ojima | 05:17 – 00:17 to Ojima |
| SShinjukuS10 towards Shinjuku | 05:08 – 00:12 | 05:08 – 00:12 |
Departure times come from the operators’ own GTFS timetables (ODPT GTFS Toei-Train-GTFS (version 20261009, valid 2026-03-14..2027-03-12) + TokyoMetro-Train-GTFS (version 20261008, valid 2026-09-19..2027-03-12)). Japan publishes two subway timetables: 平日 weekdays and 土休日 Saturdays, Sundays and national holidays. There is no separate Sunday timetable, and the December 30 – January 3 period runs the holiday timetable.
How often do trains run?
| Line | Weekdays, busiest hour | Sat / Sun / holidays, busiest hour |
|---|---|---|
| SShinjuku | 15 trains/hour (about one every 4 min) | 12 trains/hour |
Departures in one direction during the hour with the most trains at this station, counted in the operators’ timetable.
Next stations from Hamacho
Scheduled running time between Hamacho and the stations either side of it.
| Line | Next station | Running time |
|---|---|---|
| SShinjuku | S09Bakuro-yokoyama | 1 min |
| SShinjuku | S11Morishita | 1 min |
Transfers and connections
Only the Shinjuku Line stops here, and no other railway serves this station, so there is nothing to transfer to inside the station.
Accessibility
| Line | Step-free by elevator | Accessible toilet | Escalator | Exits |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SShinjuku | Yes | Yes | Yes | 2 |
- Shinjuku Line: Toei: step-free “1-route” secured; 2 elevator(s) on this line. Elevator exit(s): A2. Operator page (checked Oct 20, 2026).
Taken from the operators’ own accessibility pages and nothing else. Toei: every station has elevators and a street-gate-platform “1-route” is secured.
What is near Hamacho Station?
Hamacho Park is directly above the platforms and the Sumida river runs along its far edge, with the Shin-Ohashi and Kiyosubashi bridges crossing nearby. The Meijiza theatre is about 100 m from the exits and gives the station its second name; Kasama Inari-jinja Shrine is roughly 230 m away and the Button Museum around 290 m, with Hisamatsu Police Station and Hisamatsu Elementary School a similar distance. Offices and apartment blocks fill the rest, and Ningyocho is close enough to walk to.
| Place | Distance (straight line) | On foot, estimated |
|---|---|---|
| Meijiza 明治座 | 100 m | about 2 min |
| Hamacho Park 浜町公園 | 180 m | about 3 min |
| Kasama Inari-jinja Shrine 笠間稲荷神社 | 230 m | about 4 min |
| Button Museum | 290 m | about 5 min |
| Suehiro Shrine 末廣神社 | 380 m | about 6 min |
| 大廣神社 | 400 m | about 6 min |
| Hisamatsu Elementary School 中央区立 久松小学校 | 290 m | about 5 min |
| Hisamatsu Police Station 久松警察署 | 270 m | about 4 min |
Places from OpenStreetMap within 400 m of the station. The walking time is an estimate (straight line plus 30 %, 80 m a minute), not a measured route. © OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL.