Shin-Ōkubo Station is served by the circular Yamanote Line, with trains running every four minutes during the daytime off-peak. It is one of only two stations on the Yamanote Line that does not provide a direct connection to any other line, the other being Mejiro Station, two stops away.
Station layout
The station platform, April 2021
The elevated station consists of a single island platform serving two tracks. The Yamanote Freight Line tracks used by Saikyō Line and Shōnan-Shinjuku Line services lie to the east of the Yamanote Line tracks.
Less than a kilometer north of the sprawling Shinjuku Station, Shin-Ōkubo Station is located approximately 5 minutes' walk from Shinjuku's Kabukichō district. It is also about a 3-minute walk from Ōkubo Station on the Chūō-Sōbu Line.
Near the station, Okubo-dori (Okubo street) and surrounding side streets are lined with all kinds of small shops, most of them selling Korean food and pop-culture items. Also in the vicinity are Korean-themed bars, nightclubs, and restaurants.[3]
During the late 1940s, while Seibu Railway was planning the extension of the Seibu Shinjuku Line from Takadanobaba to Shinjuku, Seibu planned to open a station at Shin-Ōkubo. Among several plans considered, one option called for the existing JR station to be moved to the west and for Seibu to take over the existing station. Toyama Park, at that time under US occupation, was being considered as a location for a new freight yard, and the rerouting of the Yamanote and Seibu lines was intended to accommodate freight traffic to and from the new yard. However, the freight yard plan was later abandoned, and the Seibu extension opened in 1952 with no stop at Shin-Ōkubo.[4]
Station numbering was introduced in 2016 with Shin-Ōkubo being assigned station number JY16.[5][6]
Passenger statistics
In fiscal 2011, the station was used by an average of 42,433 passengers daily (boarding passengers only).[7]
The passenger figures for previous years are as shown below.
On 26 January 2001, a 47-year-old photographer from Yokohama and a 26-year-old Korean student died at the station when they were hit by a Yamanote Line train while trying to save a drunken Japanese man who had fallen off the platform onto the tracks and was also killed in the accident.[11] The Korean student's life story formed the basis for the film 26 Years Diary, released in 2007 in Japan and in 2008 in Korea.
^"⾸都圏エリアへ 「駅ナンバリング」を導⼊します" [Introduce “station numbering” to the Tokyo metropolitan area] (PDF). jreast.co.jp (in Japanese). 6 April 2016. Archived from the original(PDF) on 7 December 2022. Retrieved 7 January 2023.
^Kusamachi, Yoshikazu (7 April 2016). "JA・JK・JT・AKB…JR東日本、首都圏で駅ナンバリングなど導入へ" [JA, JK, JT, AKB … JR East to introduce station numbering in the Tokyo metropolitan area]. Response Automotive Media (in Japanese). Archived from the original on 6 August 2022. Retrieved 7 January 2023.
^ ab各駅の乗車人員 (2011年度) [Station passenger figures (Fiscal 2011)] (in Japanese). Japan: East Japan Railway Company. Retrieved 12 January 2013.
^各駅の乗車人員 (2000年度) [Station passenger figures (Fiscal 2000)] (in Japanese). Japan: East Japan Railway Company. Retrieved 12 January 2013.
^各駅の乗車人員 (2005年度) [Station passenger figures (Fiscal 2005)] (in Japanese). Japan: East Japan Railway Company. Retrieved 12 January 2013.
^各駅の乗車人員 (2010年度) [Station passenger figures (Fiscal 2010)] (in Japanese). Japan: East Japan Railway Company. Retrieved 12 January 2013.
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