The Iyo Railway (伊予鉄道 Iyo Tetsudō) is a transportation company in Matsuyama, Japan. The company or its lines are commonly known as Iyotetsu (伊予鉄). The private company operates railway, tram, and bus lines, and is a core company of Iyotetsu Group, which also operates other business such as department stores and travel agencies.
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The company was founded on September 14, 1887, and its railway line, the first one in Shikoku, was opened on October 28, 1888. "Not only was it the first railway in Shikoku but it was also the third private railway in Japan."[1]
The company currently operates tram and conventional railway lines in 1,067 mm gauge, although in the past it did use narrow 762 mm gauge and standard gauge (1,435 mm gauge).
From August 2005, its lines introduced the IC e-card, a smart card ticketing system.
Iyotetsu operates the following train lines:
Takahama Line and Ōtemachi Line are known to have one of the few surviving level junctions crossing each other.
Iyotetsu operates the Matsuyama City Lines (松山市内線 Matsuyama Shinai-sen), a system of five interconnected tram (市内電車 shinai-densha) lines.
The company operates highway buses linking Matsuyama and the major cities of Japan, including Tokyo, Ōsaka, Fukuyama, Takamatsu, Tokushima, Kōchi and others. It also operates a local network in and around the city.
Iyo Railway also operates the Botchan Ressha, diesel-powered replicas of the original Iyotetsu locomotives, well-known from Natsume Sōseki's famous 1906 novel, Botchan. The current Botchan Ressha, operating on two of the city lines since 2001, reproduces the atmosphere of early train travel in Matsuyama.
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