On 3 June 2014, JR East announced that a new station would be built between Tamachi and Shinagawa stations, at south from Tamachi Station, north from Shinagawa Station, and about southeast of Sengakuji Station. The station was built above the existing Tamachi Depot, with of the Depot's space being repurposed and redeveloped. The station was planned to open in 2020, to meet with the Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics and is the newest station to be built since
Nishi-Nippori Station (opened in 1971) for the Yamanote Line, and
Saitama-Shintoshin Station (opened in 2000) for the Keihin-Tōhoku Line. On 6 September 2016, JR East announced the outline of this station and it was positioned as the core facility of Shinagawa Development Project "Global Gateway Shinagawa". On 10 February 2017, construction on the station began. From 5 to 30 June 2018, JR East publicly invited citizens to submit ideas of names for the new station, via mail or online submission. They announced that the finalized name of the station would be announced during winter 2018, while on 4 December 2018, the name was announced to be "Takanawa Gateway". The Yamanote and Keihin-Tōhoku Lines between Shinagawa and Tamachi were rerouted via the new station on 16 November 2019 during construction that suspended train service on the lines from the early morning until around 4:00 pm. The station opened on 14 March 2020, ten days before the
summer Olympics were postponed to 2021 as a result of the
COVID-19 pandemic. However, it was believed that the shopping and dining facilities inside will not be fully completed until 2024. Yuji Fukasawa, president of JR East, has justified the naming with Takanawa's historical status of being a "gateway to
Edo", while also serving as the site for the development of an international hub in the future. (In the 1800s, the official southern entrance to Edo, as Tokyo was then called, was the
Takanawa Great Wooden Gate directly to the west of the station.) This choice has spurred criticism from several members of the public, citing the decision being made with a lack of consideration to the public's wishes. According to a poll conducted by the Japanese website
j-town.net, 95.8% of respondents disapproved of the name "Takanawa Gateway", while a
Change.org petition calling for a name change had gathered over 9,500 signatures as of 9 December 2018. At the time the petition ended, it had 47,766 signatures. ==See also==