JR East to run bus service through Fukushima no-entry zone

[yuiyoshida]

Train services resume June 1 between Tatsuta and Hirono stations on the JR Joban Line. Temporary storage sites for contaminated soil and other waste are seen along the tracks. (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

East Japan Railway Co. (JR East) will start a bus service on Jan. 31 that runs through an area with high radiation levels near the stricken Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, officials said Jan. 22.

The service, operated by JR East’s Mito branch, will be the first public transportation in the “difficult-to-return zone,” the government-designated area where evacuees will not be allowed to return home at least until March 2017.

The route will connect Tatsuta Station in the town of Naraha and Haranomachi Station in Minami-Soma on the JR Joban Line. Train services between the stations have been suspended since the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami triggered the nuclear disaster in March 2011.

As an alternative to the suspended rail operations, the bus service will cover a 46-kilometer north-south stretch of National Route No. 6, according to the JR East Mito office. The section through the difficult-to-return zone will be 14 km.

http://ajw.asahi.com/article/0311disaster/fukushima/AJ201501230057