Watarase Keikoku Railway Second Godo Tunnel

A tunnel that kept the older spelling

The Watarase Keikoku Railway Second Godo Tunnel is a single-track railway tunnel of 1912 at Godo in Higashimachi, Midori City, Gunma Prefecture, listed as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property in 2009. It lies about 540 metres west of Godo Station, curving gently as it passes through the hillside. The bore runs 103 metres, its brick lining four courses thick, with cut stone in the side walls and portals.

The name preserves a spelling no longer used. Under the Ashio Railway and the later national line, the station here was written with characters read Godo but different from those of the place name, to avoid confusion with Kobe Station in Hyogo Prefecture, whose characters are the same but read differently. When the third sector company took over in 1989 the station was renamed to match the local place name. The two tunnels kept the older writing, and both are still read Godo.

In 1954 and 1958 a reinforced concrete rockfall shed 20 metres long and a 7.3 metre retaining wall were built out from the western portal, bringing the whole to 123 metres.

The plant of a mining railway, listed together

The line began as the Ashio Railway, laid to bring copper ore down the Watarase gorge. The section between Omamamachi and Godo opened in September 1912 and the rails reached Ashio in December of the same year. Nationalised in 1918, the route lost most of its freight and passenger traffic when the Ashio mine closed in 1973 and was marked for abandonment. Local campaigning kept it alive until a third sector company, Watarase Keikoku Railway, took it on in 1989.

On 2 November 2009, with notice published on the 19th, 38 structures between Kiryu and Mato became Registered Tangible Cultural Properties, the first case in Japan of an entire line being listed across two prefectures. The Watarase Keikoku Railway Second Godo Tunnel is one of them, registered under the criterion of contribution to the historic landscape of the country, and in 2016 the group was recognised as a Civil Engineering Heritage. A bore of 1912 is still in service because trains kept running over it.

Two portals from across the river

The Watarase Keikoku Railway Second Godo Tunnel sits about 180 metres east of the First Godo Tunnel. Leaving Godo Station towards Kiryu, the portal appears roughly a minute out, and another minute takes the train through this bore and into the next one.

From the far bank of the Watarase River there is a spot where the Konaka side portal of the Second Godo Tunnel and the Godosawa bridge can be taken in together; the operator recommends it when the leaves turn. Look closely at the portal itself and the cut stone of 1912 meets the later concrete rockfall shed face to face, two building periods sharing one entrance.

Godo Station keeps its 1912 building, itself a listed structure, and fills up in April for the peach blossom festival.

Visiting

The Watarase Keikoku Railway Second Godo Tunnel is on live single track and the track area is closed, so it is seen from trains between Godo and Konaka. Godo is a staffed station with a restaurant housed in old rolling stock, which makes it a practical base for riding this section and back. The Torokko Watarase Keikoku and Torokko Wasshi trains both call here, and both need a Torokko seat coupon on top of the ordinary fare, 700 yen for adults and 350 yen for children from 1 September 2026.

A one day free pass costs 1,880 yen for adults and 940 yen for children. The whole line runs 44.1 kilometres from Kiryu to Mato, about an hour and a half each way. Photography from the carriage is unrestricted; drone filming of the track area and of trains is banned. Operating days appear on the company website, and fares here were checked on 13 September 2026.