Hokkaido Mountain Pass Closures 2026–27: When the Roads Shut, and What to Do If You Meet a Gate

The short version: Hokkaido's mountain roads start closing in September

If you are picking up a rental car in Hokkaido between mid-September and early May, there is one thing the map apps will not tell you clearly enough: several of the island's best mountain roads close for the winter on a fixed date and stay closed until spring. The first gates shut in the Daisetsuzan mountains on 1 October; the Shiretoko Pass follows in early November; none of them reopen before late April. Turn up a day late and you meet a barrier, not a view.

This guide is for drivers, not hikers. It lists which passes and scenic roads close, the confirmed 2026 dates where the authorities have published them, what "typical" means for the ones they have not, the roads that stay open all winter (and why that is not the same as "always open"), what to do when you meet a closed gate, and the official pages to check on the morning you set out. Dates were checked against the official Japanese sources on 7 September 2026.

Closure calendar at a glance (autumn 2026 – spring 2027)

Two things to read off that table. First, the Ginsendai and Kogen Onsen roads are open for only about four months a year, mid-June to early October. Second, "typically" is doing real work: Hokkaido's road authorities publish each autumn's schedule only a week or two before it starts, and an early snowfall can bring a closure forward without notice. Treat last year's date as a planning guide, not a promise.

Two different kinds of "closed"

This is the most useful thing to understand about winter driving in Hokkaido, and the reason a lot of visitors get confused.

• Scheduled winter closures. The roads in the table above. A gate is locked on a published date and the road is not plowed at all until spring. You can plan around these with a calendar.
• Year-round passes that close in bad weather. The big national-route passes — Mikuni Pass (Route 273, the highest national-road pass in Hokkaido), Nissho Pass (Route 274, Sapporo side to Obihiro), Sekihoku Pass (Route 39, Sounkyo to Kitami), Karikachi Pass (Route 38) and others — are kept open and plowed all winter. But when a blizzard, whiteout or avalanche risk is forecast they are closed with little or no notice, sometimes for hours, sometimes for a day or two. You cannot plan around these with a calendar; you can only check on the day.

So "Mikuni Pass is open in winter" is true, and "Mikuni Pass is always passable in winter" is not. If your itinerary crosses a pass between December and March, build in a spare half-day and check the road information pages (listed at the end) before you leave the hotel. Our first-timer's guide to winter driving in Hokkaido explains what whiteouts and the TOMARE signs actually look like from the driver's seat.

September: Daisetsuzan's autumn-leaf roads go reservation-only

Hokkaido's autumn colours arrive first, and highest, in the Daisetsuzan mountains north-east of Furano and Biei. The two roads that take you closest — the Ginsendai Line and the Kogen Onsen Road — are narrow, dead-end mountain roads, and every year at peak colour they are put under a vehicle restriction. For 2026 the system has changed, and the change matters if you have read older blog posts or been before.

What changed in 2026

• Private cars are no longer banned during the restriction — they are allowed with an advance reservation. Cars run in alternating one-way groups on the restricted section, with a booking, prepayment and a cooperation fee of ¥2,000 per car.
• The shuttle bus is now a reserved charter bus (Ginsendai only): ¥2,500 one way / ¥5,000 return per person from Sounkyo Information Center. Buses leave Sounkyo at 06:00 and 07:00 and come back down from Ginsendai at 15:00 and 15:30. Same-day tickets only if seats are left.
• There is no bus to Kogen Onsen in 2026 — reserved-car access only.
• All bookings are through KKday; the cut-off is 15:00 the day before. The gate on each road closes at 16:30.

The official page is Kamikawa Town's autumn vehicle restriction page (Japanese). It links to the KKday booking pages — private-car access and charter bus; KKday's site can be switched to English. Enquiries: Kamikawa Town Industry and Economy Division, 01658-2-4058, Japanese only.

Until 2025 the rule was the opposite — private cars were banned outright and a ¥1,000 shuttle ran instead — so if a friend tells you "just park at Sounkyo and take the bus", that advice is out of date. The most common failure this year will be driving up without a booking and being turned round at the gate.

Getting there: Sounkyo, the hot-spring village at the base of the mountains, is about 190 km from central Sapporo — roughly 2.5–3 hours via the Doo and Asahikawa–Monbetsu expressways to Kamikawa-Sounkyo IC, then Route 39. From Asahikawa it is about an hour. With a 06:00 first bus, staying in Sounkyo the night before is the realistic plan. Daisetsuzan pairs naturally with the farmland roads in our Sapporo to Furano and Biei itinerary. Outside the restriction dates you can simply drive up — but the window between "restriction ends" and "closed for winter" is a week or less, and the leaves at 1,500 m are usually past their best by then.

October and November: the gates close in order

• 1 October — Ginsendai Line closes (confirmed). 9 October, 17:00 — Kogen Onsen Road closes (confirmed).
• Late October — Niseko Panorama Line (Pref. Road 66), the high road over the back of the Niseko range between Kyowa and Rankoshi. Last winter it shut at 10:00 on 24 October 2025 and reopened on 27 April 2026; the 2026 date is announced by Kutchan and Kyowa towns in October. Only the high section closes — Niseko's resorts, Kutchan and Niseko town are reached on Routes 5 and 276, which stay open, so the Panorama Line is never open during the ski season.
• 31 October (last year) — Tsubetsu Pass (Pref. Road 588) and the Iozan – Lake Mashu 1st Observatory road (Pref. Road 52). The Kushiro road office posts the new season's dates in October–November.
• Early November — Shiretoko Pass (Route 334, Utoro–Rausu), the closure everybody has heard of. Last season it was closed every night from 17:00 to 09:00 from 24 October to 3 November 2025, then closed completely from 17:00 on 4 November 2025. It reopened in spring 2026 in stages, with unrestricted 24-hour access from 29 May. Even inside the "open" hours of the night-closure period it can be shut if the surface is expected to freeze. The 2026 schedule had not been announced at the time of writing; the Abashiri Development Bureau publishes it, usually mid-to-late October, on its Route 334 status page (Japanese).
• Mid-November — Akan – Tsurui (Pref. Road 1093), last winter from 14 November 2025 to 5 June 2026, more than half the year.

If autumn leaves are the point of the trip, work through the roads in the order they close: Daisetsuzan in the second half of September, Niseko in early-to-mid October, the lakes of eastern Hokkaido in the second half of October.

What closing the Shiretoko Pass means in practice: Utoro and Rausu are 23.8 km apart over the pass and roughly 150 km apart around it (back down Route 334 and 244 to the Shibetsu area, then Route 335 up the east coast) — two and a half to three hours on winter roads. Most winter visitors pick one side, usually Utoro for the drift-ice cruises, and stay there.

"But the map says I can get there"

The closures above are roads, not places, and that distinction saves trips.

• Lake Mashu is not closed in winter. What closes is the road that climbs from the Iozan (sulphur mountain) side to the 1st Observatory. The observatory itself is reachable all winter from the Teshikaga town side. Some visitors read "Route 52 closed" and skip the lake; others read "you can drive to Mashu" and try to come from Iozan. Both are half right. Check the section, not the road number.
• Sounkyo does not close. Route 39 through the gorge and over the Sekihoku Pass is a year-round national road, and the Kurodake ropeway runs in winter. It is the side roads up to Ginsendai and Kogen Onsen that shut.
• Lake Akan does not close either. Route 240 from Kushiro and Route 241 from Lake Kussharo stay open. If your app routes you Akan → Tsurui (for the red-crowned cranes) in winter, make sure it is not using Pref. Road 1093; the open way round is Route 240 towards Kushiro, then Pref. Road 53 north to Tsurui.

Rental-car navigation units in Japan are generally good at seasonal closures; phone apps are patchy. Before a rural winter drive, look at the route your app has drawn and ask whether it uses a prefectural road number from the table above.

What to do when you arrive at a closed gate

1. Do not go around it. There is no plowing, no patrol and no phone signal beyond the barrier, and your rental contract almost certainly voids cover on a closed road.
2. Turn back to the last town and check the official road information (links below). A scheduled winter closure will not lift; a weather closure on a year-round pass often lifts within hours once the plows have been through.
3. Take the low road. Every pass in this article has a lower, longer route that stays open: the coast round Shiretoko; Routes 5/276 instead of the Panorama Line; the Doto Expressway or Route 38 over Karikachi if Mikuni or Nissho is shut for weather; Route 240 instead of Pref. Road 1093. Expressways are plowed first in a storm, so when in doubt drop down to the expressway even if it is longer.
4. If night is coming, stop. Book a room in the nearest town rather than pushing over an alternative pass in the dark. Rural Hokkaido roads after dark in winter are unlit, drifting and empty. This is what the spare half-day was for.

The winter kit your rental needs for pass driving

From November onwards, treat any pass crossing as a winter drive even if the city you left was dry. Passes get winter about a month before the lowlands.

• Studless winter tires. Hokkaido rental companies fit them as standard roughly November to April at no extra cost, but October is the change-over month — if you collect a car in October and plan a pass, ask at booking whether it will be on winter tires. Chains are not the answer here; see what your Hokkaido rental comes with and why you almost never need chains.
• 4WD if offered. It does not help you stop, but it helps you get moving again on a snowy gradient.
• Full tank before the pass. Stations are sparse on the far side and many close early.
• Real winter clothes in the car for everyone, even on a "we'll only be in the car" day. If you are held at a closure for two hours in a blizzard, the heater is your only warmth and you may need to walk to a rest house. Our winter clothing guide has the specifics; the month-by-month what-to-wear guide covers the shoulder seasons, and November is the month that catches people out — mild in Sapporo, full winter on the passes.

Licence, insurance and the Hokkaido Expressway Pass are covered in our guide to renting a car in Hokkaido.

Where to check on the day (official sources)

The Japanese-only pages are short and mostly dates, so your phone's page-translate function handles them well. The words to look for are 通行止 (closed to traffic), 冬期 / 冬季 (winter season), 解除 (lifted, reopened) and 予定 (planned — it can still change).

FAQ

Q. Can I drive a rental car over a mountain pass in winter?

Yes, on the year-round passes, as long as they are not closed for weather that day and the car is on winter tires — which a Hokkaido rental will be from about November. Drive slowly, leave early, and read the winter driving guide first. Scheduled winter-closure roads are physically gated and off limits to everyone.

Q. What happens if I go to Ginsendai in September without a reservation?

During the restriction period (12–23 September 2026; 19–30 September for Kogen Onsen) cars without a booking are turned back at the gate. Book on KKday by 15:00 the day before. Outside those dates the road is open to anyone until it closes for winter on 1 October (Ginsendai) or 9 October (Kogen Onsen).

Q. When exactly does the Shiretoko Pass close in 2026?

Not announced as of early September. Based on recent years, expect night closures (17:00–09:00) from around the fourth week of October and a full closure from the first week of November, and check the Abashiri Development Bureau page above before you commit to crossing.

Q. Are the closure dates the same every year?

Roughly, within a week or so — but they are set each autumn and brought forward when snow comes early. Use last year's dates to plan and this year's official announcement to book.

Closures are only half the story of a Hokkaido winter road trip; the surface under your tires is the other half. Start with Winter Driving in Hokkaido: A First-Timer's Complete Guide.

Before you travel: Closure dates, restriction periods, fees and booking methods change, and roads can close without notice in bad weather. The 2026 dates above were checked against official Japanese sources on 7 September 2026; "typical" dates are from the 2025–26 season. Please check the official pages listed above before you set out.

Hokudora (ホクドラ) is a Hokkaido driving and travel site based in Sapporo. More English guides · 日本語版はこちら