Four tunnels, one coin, a lot of maples
The thing about living in Nagoya for two decades is you start thinking you've seen all the good stuff. Then someone mentions walking through abandoned railway tunnels in a maple forest for the price of a convenience store onigiri, and you realize you've been missing out.
The Aigi Tunnels open twice a year—spring and autumn—and then they lock the gates for the other ten months. Right now we're in the autumn window: November 29 through December 7. Entry costs ¥100—less than a coffee—and the JR ride from Nagoya runs about ¥500 each way. If you've got decent shoes and a morning to spare, you're in.
Here's what actually happens. You take the JR Chuo Line from Nagoya Station—about 30 minutes, watching the city thin out into valley and trees—and get off at Jōkōji, an unmanned station where the platform smells like wet leaves and diesel. Buy your round-trip ticket before you leave Nagoya or just tap your IC card, because there's nobody here to sell you one when you panic later.
Walk 300 meters upstream along the river, following the other people with cameras and hiking boots, and you'll hit a gate with a small reception tent. Hand over your ¥100. They hand you a ticket that doubles as insurance. Then you're on the old trackbed.
This is what you're walking: 1.7 kilometers of the original 1900 Chuo Line, abandoned in 1966 when they rerouted through longer, faster tunnels. For forty years, the forest took it back—vines, saplings, the whole patient reclamation. Then in 2005, a group of locals decided to dig it out by hand. Six months of clearing vegetation. Now a volunteer NPO keeps it open a few weeks a year so people like us can walk through.
Four red-brick tunnels, numbers three through six. The kind of Meiji-era engineering that still looks impossibly solid. You walk into the first one and the temperature drops. The light from the entrance shrinks behind you. Your phone flashlight catches the curve of old bricks, maybe some moss, the tracks long gone but the shape of them still there in the gravel. Then the far end opens up and you're back in the maples—reds and oranges hanging over the path, fallen leaves crunching under your boots, the Shonai River cutting through the rocks below.
It's not Korankei. It's narrower, quieter, stranger. You're walking inside the bones of something that used to move people and freight between Nagoya and the mountains, and now it just moves you, slowly, on foot, with your jacket zipped up against the November air.
There are usually a few food stalls near the entrance—local snacks, hot drinks, the kind of festival-lite setup that appears when something in Japan opens for nine days and then vanishes. On weekends it gets busy around mid-morning, so if you want the tunnels less crowded, aim for a weekday or show up when the gates open at 9:30.
The round trip takes about two hours if you're stopping for photos. And you will stop for photos, because the light coming through those tunnel arches with the maples framed inside is the kind of thing that makes you pull out your phone even if you've been trying to be present and mindful or whatever.
You walk into the first one and the temperature drops. The light from the entrance shrinks behind you. Your phone flashlight catches the curve of old bricks, maybe some moss, the tracks long gone but the shape of them still there in the gravel.
Practical stuff: it's gravel and dirt, sometimes uneven. Not great for strollers or anyone who needs smooth walking surfaces. Bring a flashlight or use your phone for the darker stretches. If it rains, they cancel the event—valley gets muddy, tunnels get slippery. Check the weather before you go, or just accept that you might take a train to Kasugai for nothing, which is also a very Japan experience.
This works if you like trains, old brick, autumn leaves, or the idea that ¥100 can still buy you an entire afternoon of something you've never done before. It works if you don't have a car and you're tired of reading about places you can't reach without one. It works if you've been in Nagoya long enough to want something just outside the usual rotation—not Kyoto, not the castle again, just a half-day on the old Chuo Line with red leaves overhead and a century-old tunnel swallowing you up every few hundred meters.
I walked it last autumn and kept thinking about those volunteers spending six months digging this out. Not because anyone asked them to. Just because it seemed worth saving. That's the kind of thing that keeps you here after twenty years—the small, stubborn care for things that don't make obvious sense but matter anyway.
You'll be back in Nagoya by late afternoon. The trains run frequently. Your feet will be tired in a good way. And you'll have spent less than the cost of lunch at any department store restaurant.
One coin. One morning. Four tunnels. A lot of maples.
The Details
Autumn Opening of the Aigi Tunnels
(愛岐トンネル群 秋の特別公開)
Location:
Former JNR Chuo Line
Tunnels No. 3–6 and abandoned railway
(approx. 1.7 km), Tamano-cho, Kasugai
Dates:
Nov. 29 (Sat) – Dec. 7 (Sun), 2025
Times: 09:30–15:00
(last entry 14:00)
Price:
¥100
(elementary school students and younger free)
Notes:
Event canceled on rainy days.
No parking available—come by train.
Not barrier-free; uneven surfaces throughout.
Address:
Near Jōkōji Station
Tamano-cho, Kasugai
Aichi 487-0004
Website: https://aigi-tunnel.org/
Access
By Train:
JR Chuo Line from Nagoya Station to Jōkōji Station
(approximately 30 minutes).
From Jōkōji Station, walk 300 meters upstream along the river.
Note:
Jōkōji is an unmanned station.
Purchase a round-trip ticket at Nagoya Station or use an IC card.
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