Horikawa

Weekday departures: 70/day · Sat & holiday departures: 78/day

First / last departure (weekday): 6:11 / 23:33

Busiest hour: 7:00–8:00 (6)

0:00 ─ 23:00

Figures are typical departures in the timetable data, not a live service count.

Timetable data as of 26 April 2026.

• Kikuchi Line: Shinsuya ⇄ Hakenomiya

Horikawa Station opened on 26 August 1913 as a station on the Kumamoto Electric Railway Kikuchi Line, in Hakenomiya 1-chōme, Kita-ku, Kumamoto, Kumamoto Prefecture — station number KD12. Freight handling ended on 1 August 1979, railway parcel handling on 1 February 1984, and on-site ticket issuing on 1 May 1985, when the station switched to the numbered-ticket (seiriken) system. With the introduction of an automatic block system of the electronic code-verification type on 11 April 1988 the station became unstaffed, with only ticket-window work contracted out to the subsidiary Kumamoto Dentetsu Kankō. On 1 April 2015 the Kumamoto Area Promotion IC card ("Kumamon no IC CARD") was supported, and on 1 October 2019 station numbering was introduced.

The station name comes from the Horikawa, an Edo-period channel cut from the Shira River to the Tsuboi River that once flowed nearby. Horikawa is unusual among Kumamoto Electric Railway stations in having a still-occupied station building — although it has no railway staff, a Kumamoto Dentetsu Kankō employee is stationed inside to manage the station and sell commuter passes (open weekdays 07:30 - 18:00, Saturdays 07:30 - 12:00, closed Sundays and holidays). Until the early 1980s, while the Miyoshi - Kikuchi section still existed, scheduled trains from Fujisakigūmae turned back here, and the station's stabling sidings were used to hold rolling stock overnight; the track layout still allows a turnback towards Kita-Kumamoto from the Miyoshi-bound side of platform 1. The IC card reader (entry only) is on the platform rather than at the gate, to suit users entering from the rear of the station.