On May 1st, Tokyu Railways celebrated the 100th anniversary of the Setagaya Line. To mark the occasion, Tokyu organized a variety of local events.
Let me review the Setagaya Line. It operates under the Tramways Act, connecting Sangenjaya on the Tokyu Den-en-toshi Line with Shimo-Takaido on the Keio Line. The line is 5.0 kilometers long, entirely double-tracked, electrified at 600 V DC, and built to a 1,372 mm gauge. The Setagaya Line originally opened in 1925 as a branch of the Tamagawa Line (hereafter Tamaden). The Tamaden main line, which opened in 1907, connected Shibuya with Futako-Tamagawa via Sangenjaya. Since the Tamaden was constructed as a streetcar line running along National Highway 246, it unfortunately had to be abolished in 1969 due to severe traffic congestion. The Setagaya Line, on the other hand, was built as a dedicated right-of-way, which is why only this branch line has survived.
One of the anniversary events was the addition of special memorial stickers on the trams. Please look at the top photo. This is Set 305 of the Tokyu 300 series tramcars, carrying a special round memorial sticker on the front. It looks beautiful, but wait a moment—something is missing. Speaking of the 300 series, why not also capture Set 301 in Tamaden colors? As I mentioned before, Set 301 is the representative tramcar of the Setagaya Line. That’s why I returned to Yamashita stop on another day to photograph Set 301 (see the photo below). Railfans are sticklers for detail when it comes to their photo subjects, aren’t they?
