Enoshima Electric Railway (Enoden)

[Guest bill937ca]

Known as the "Enoden" to locals, the Enoshima Electric Railway is a U shaped single track interurban south of Tokyo. The Enoden encompasses a short street running section, a tunnel and a short elevated section along with very narrow right of way and a short stretch along the Japan Sea. Trains run every 12 minutes in each direction all day.

 

An article with a map of the line.

 

http://www.japaneserailwaysociety.com/hiroshi/eno/shonan.htm

 

You Tube:

 

 

 

 

[Guest bill937ca]

Photos along the Enoden:

 

http://www.geocities.jp/hannkyuu3000/enoden/enoden-1.htm

[acousticco]

Great stuff Bill,

Enoden is a great little line, I'm a big fan of the ultra narrow right of way sneaking between buildings...

-Cody

 

PS: here's a link to a pretty nice looking Enoden layout being built:

http://www.secondintention.com/pleasure/enoden/

[Guest bill937ca]

More video that shows much of the line.

 

http://youtube.com/watch?v=q4YNmQsWWRA

 

http://youtube.com/watch?v=N4GbkW3EyLE

 

http://youtube.com/watch?v=EgwcrJnWjDs

 

http://youtube.com/watch?v=iXf9cKNxNLY

 

http://youtube.com/watch?v=JbWkGvM9TqM

 

http://youtube.com/watch?v=9BW6nFX8vrM

 

http://youtube.com/watch?v=S1cGMQphQfc

 

http://youtube.com/watch?v=veekWA0Cht8

[bill937ca]

Inspite of its appearance the Enoden  is a railroad with ATS, through-ticketing, and high-platforms.  Most of the right-of-way is on very narrow reservation.  Their is a short elevated section, seaside section and a short tunrel. The entire line is single track with several passing loops at stations.

 

 

 

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3HFdjD6wDeM

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WiictFMqW2A

[Guest ___]

I am/was very grateful that I I was able to ride the entire length and back two years ago. It's definitely well worth the trip down to ride from Tokyo Proper.

[bill937ca]

I am/was very grateful that I I was able to ride the entire length and back two years ago. It's definitely well worth the trip down to ride from Tokyo Proper.

 

And there are excursion packages available from Tokyo.

 

From any station on the Yamanote line by JR East.

 

http://www.jreast.co.jp/e/pass/kamakura_enoshima.html

 

From Shinjuku by Romancecar on the Odakyu Electric Railway.

 

http://www.odakyu.jp/english/freepass/enokama_01.html

 

As an alternative, the Odakyu Railway also offers an excursion package for those wishing to ride the nearby Hakone Tozan Railway.

 

http://www.odakyu.jp/english/freepass/hakone_01.html

[Martijn Meerts]

Seeing those video's makes it very clear (and understandable) why many people choose to model something based on the Enoden ;)

[Kabutoni]

Enodennnnnn! Soon to be in my hands as I've ordered a few models :9

 

I loved the ride on it when I was there last time (6-7 years ago) and I'll visit it again to revive the memories!

[Guest ___]

It was such a dreary day when I rode back in 05.

 

I remembered I got to Kamakura just to ride out and shoot the Enoshima Electric Railways. The entire line was single tracked with passing sidings at the stations I alighted at Inamuraga, a little seaside town to shoot. Got some shots at a crossing where I found a BP Solar module powering a foot light for a pedestrian crossing over the tracks.

 

A delivery man was walking down the tracks when a north bound train came. There must have been two, maybe three feet between the house and the side of the train. The engineer didn’t even blow for him. And, I thought I got close to the trains. Climbed a small hill where the was a tori and some graves to shoot. I also got to shoot down on the tracks from there. It was a pretty good shoot.

 

Got a little ways from where the station was when it started to rain. I ducked in to a small garage to put my camera way. I just stepped under the roof by a half a meter. The owner didn’t seem to mind me too much, or the little kid on the bike. Sorta sucked, that it waited to rain until I was a good ways from the station. But, before the rain hit, I did get some good grade shots, as well as a few near street running pix. At this point the rain really didn’t let up so I went back to the station.

 

Rode the train all the way to the end of the line. The biggest note worthy point was the train ran through Enoshima, a small town along the ocean known for its many shrines and temples. Due to the weather I didn’t go exploring. There was a mountain to our right, a four lane road to the left, and then the ocean. In the distance you could see the island. It sort of reminded me of Kilarny, Ireland.

 

On the inbound trip, I sat right behind the motorman. After Enoshima, we were weaving through a narrow city alley. The entire line was single tracked so it made for a pretty wild experience as so far as railroading goes. Came out of the alley right to street running, and the cars had little place to go if we were coming. It was awesome.

 

Arrived at the end of the line and shot for a bit. I wanted to ride at the head end again, but there were some kids with their mothers and they were all excited, so I yielded back and let them have the front rows behind the motorman. Got back to Kamakura and shot there for a bit. I knew I was low on cash, but I splurged and spent ¥3000 on souvenirs from Enoshima Electronic Railways—two DVD’s, a and mini train that I rode.

[scott]

I hope you will all forgive me if I point out that my Modemo Enoden 300 is for sale on eBay right now:

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=270549006313&ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT

[scott]

Ignoring that last little self-serving message--if I *was* going to model an urban transit system, it would almost certainly be Enoden or something inspired by it. I love how the buildings and vegetation come right up to the line.

[cteno4]

heres a little stretch of enoden on google maps where you can ride along with a tram on the tracks. pretty fun.

 

http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&t=h&layer=c&cbll=35.303893,139.518662&panoid=gtQvy_kKS_FHT-7HmM_Vtg&cbp=12,75.99,,0,0.39&msa=0&msid=103303267754943903799.0004822b7e10871e50b0e&ll=35.303893,139.518771&spn=0,359.998914&z=21

 

its amazing how much of enoden you can follow along at street view and really get some great ideas from. always loved enoden, and have collected a lot of its trams, but for some reason i never really thought of modeling it. now ive scrapped my mini tram layout with the city and the folded figure 8 design in favor of something enoden inspired. even though it will be single track i think having the line snake all over the place will be great fun and can go from city (fujisawa) to almost country side/small town, to suburban. has a tunnel, elevated, sea side, bridges, canals, man what more could you ask to cram in! even some small farming with lots with veg gardens on them!

 

would be the one to automate as well too, but even just using a reversing unit and passing tracks, one tram could be running and simple to switch another out to run off a passing track.

 

thinking maybe this as a modular layout, sort of a bend track system with the single line near the center (+-2" maybe) like a bend track could be fun. maybe module sizes around 12-15" deep so you can get a good layer of scenery in and maybe 18-22" long. then it could also have a few 30, 45 and 90 modules to make it snake down a table or two and maybe hook over to another for an L. sort of an E-Trak...

 

cheers

 

jeff

[scott]

What's a "bend track system"?

[cteno4]

Bend track is a more flexible modular system than Ntrak that basically only has the restriction of the number of tracks (1-4), the separation of the tracks. sometimes 1 or 2 tracks go down the center of the modules or they have one or two tracks on each side of the module at a standard separation so they can be flipped either way. folks also do offset modules as well. you can even snake the tracks so it comes in offset at one end and ends at a different offset at the other end (as opposed to n track with the tracks pretty fixed where they go on the module unless you extend your module out further.) there are a few standards out there, but some folks roll their own as well.

 

this gives you the freedom to make a very wandering layout. with two track bend track modules you can also have a ballon module that is basically a loop back between the two tracks, allowing you to do peninsulas easily.

 

this layout shows you the ability of bend track to make an interesting modular layout that can get easily transported or extended.

 

http://www.zealot.com/?p=vB162713

 

cheers

 

jeff

[scott]

Interesting--thanks!