Mototate

Departure data for this station is not available on this site.

Mototate Station opened on 5 December 1919 as a station of what is now the JR East Uetsu Main Line, in Sakata, Yamagata Prefecture. Sakata sits in the north of Yamagata's Shōnai region and was formed in November 2005 by the merger of the old Sakata City with Yawata, Matsuyama and Hirata towns. The municipality borders the Sea of Japan to the west, Mt. Chōkai to the north and the Dewa Hills to the east, and historically prospered as a North-bound (kitamaebune) shipping port after Kawamura Zuiken established the western coastal shipping route in 1672 — a prosperity captured in the saying "Sakai in the west, Sakata in the east." It hosts Yamagata Prefecture's only Major Port (Sakata Port) and Shōnai Airport.

Mototate's connection to the postwar Shōwa Emperor tour of 1947 — an Imperial train running from Akita Station to Mototate Station — coincides with the Emperor's August 15 1947 visit to Hiyoriyama Park in Sakata, where some 15,000 residents turned out to greet him.