Higashi-Nemuro Station marked its final day of operations Friday, with local residents and rail enthusiasts bidding farewell to the easternmost train station in Japan.

The unstaffed station in the city of Nemuro, Hokkaido, was opened in 1961 on the Nemuro Main Line, chiefly for use by students commuting to and from a nearby high school.

As the number of users is unlikely to recover from a prolonged decline, however, Hokkaido Railway, or JR Hokkaido, has decided to close the station in conjunction with its timetable revision scheduled for Saturday.