July 14, 2025
Self-driving shuttle buses will be operating in Leuven before the end of this year. The vehicles will be able to seat eight passengers and will drive around the city center. With this pilot project, Leuven is following the example of other European cities, such as Zurich, Barcelona, and Paris. The project is part of the […]
July 11, 2025
With 4,070 abolished trains per month in the first half of the year, the Belgian public railroad company NMBS/SNCB scored a new record, but one of the kinds you prefer not to show off during company presentations or half-yearly overviews. The same period in 2023, the previous record year, involved 4,016 trips per month. In […]
July 10, 2025
The Belgian public railroad company NMBS/SNCB has put the former station building of Londerzeel up for sale through its real estate platform. The setting price for the building with a land area of 277 m² is 245,000 euros. The municipality of Londerzeel, in Flemish Brabant, is pleased that NMBS/SNCB is finally taking steps to give […]
July 08, 2025
The Flemish public transport company De Lijn will increase the amount of its administrative fines by 18.37%. The acceptable amounts thus follow the fare indexation implemented in April. According to Flemish Minister of Mobility Annick De Ridder (N-VA), it is logical for fines to follow that price trend and should “continue to encourage people to […]
July 08, 2025
In Brussels, the bus, metro, streetcar, and train are regaining importance after a decline during the Covid-19 pandemic. Not only is the number of travelers increasing proportionally, but the number of trips by public transport in the capital is also rising, according to a recent survey by Brussels Mobility. Looking purely at the market share, […]
July 04, 2025
Belgian public railroad company NMBS/SNCB is to roll out an action plan to “improve the working environment of employees.” It is doing so following a welfare survey conducted early this year by IDEWE, an external service for prevention and protection at work. According to the unions, the survey’s results and conclusions, which measured, among other […]
July 01, 2025
Flemish public transport operator De Lijn is becoming greener without having to do anything about it. As of today, the private bus operators that provide rides on behalf of De Lijn are deploying 588 new electric buses on De Lijn’s network. According to the Federation of Belgian Bus and Coach Operators (FBAA), this is “the […]
June 30, 2025
Children younger than twelve can travel for free on the coastal tram in July and August if they have a beach flower with them. Transport company De Lijn presented its colorful summer campaign last Friday in Bredene. With this campaign, De Lijn is linking a true coastal tradition to one of its most iconic lines and […]
June 30, 2025
The Board of Directors of the Belgian public railroad company NMBS/SNCB has postponed its decision on designating Spanish CAF as the preferred bidder for a billion-euro order for new railcars. NMBS/SNCB’s decision drew considerable political criticism, and CAF competitors Alstom and Siemens also appealed to the Council of State. In a reaction, NMBS/SNCB refers to […]
June 25, 2025
Hype, the Paris-based company that, no pun intended, created hype with the news that it was offering hydrogen cabs in the Île-de-France region, is pulling out of the hydrogen market. “Gray hydrogen and its alibi of blue hydrogen have won this round in Île-de-France,” says an embittered Hype in a LinkedIn post, pointing an accusing […]
June 25, 2025
BYD is leveling up the game for electric buses once again. After presenting the B12 at Busworld Europe 2023 in Brussels, the first model with a Blade Battery integrated into the chassis, the Chinese manufacturer has now unveiled the B13.b at the UITP Summit in Hamburg. This low-entry 13-meter electric intercity bus surpasses the B12 […]
June 24, 2025
Since Monday, June 23rd, the Flemish public transport company De Lijn has officially put its first electric buses, manufactured by the Chinese company BYD, into service. These are the first of 92 e-buses ordered. At Jacob Autocars, which is part of Hansea, one of the largest private bus companies in Belgium that also provides transport […]
June 17, 2025
The Belgian government is allocating over 76 million euros from the European Recovery Fund to rail. With just under 70 million euros, railroad network operator Infrabel will get the lion’s share of the envelope. Among other things, the money will be used for the electrification of the network, while stations will also be upgraded with […]
June 17, 2025
According to CEO Brieuc de Meeûs, the Brussels public transport company MIVB/STIB will launch a tender next week to order 300 new all-electric buses. This is stated in several media outlets, including Le Soir and Bruzz. The plan is to deploy the new buses in 2028 and 2029. Some 450 fully electric MIVB/STIB buses are […]
June 13, 2025
After a year of dragging its feet on greening its fleet, the Flemish public transport company now seems to be reaching full cruising speed in terms of curbing its CO2. On top of the 230 new buses currently being delivered, De Lijn is ordering another 290 electric buses. This investment of 185 million euros aligns […]
June 12, 2025
The Walloon public transport company TEC carried out 155.4 million rides last year, 146.4 million of which were in scheduled services. That’s an increase of 4 million or 2,78% over 2023. Interestingly, no figures are yet available on the number of travelers in 2024; for 2023, it reported 151.6 million travelers. But it does state […]
June 11, 2025
The European Federation of Bicycle Associations has named the Belgian railroad company NMBS/SNCB, along with the Swiss railroad company SBB, as the continent’s most bicycle-friendly rail companies. However, the Cyclists’ Union continues to find accessibility problematic, a point that is also apparent when examining the state of Flemish stations from the perspective of a person […]
June 10, 2025
Eurostar plans to run direct trains from London to Frankfurt and Geneva starting in 2030. Both train journeys would take some five hours. The high-speed train operator also plans to invest heavily in its fleet. The rail company will invest some 2 billion euros to boost the number of trains by 30%. Pushed by competition […]
June 06, 2025
Flemish public transport company De Lijn had to cancel 244,000 journeys last year. Once again, these are unflattering figures for De Lijn, which also received a lot of criticism last year during the rollout of its new plan for basic accessibility. According to MP Amina Vandenheuvel (PVDA), who requested the figures from Flemish Minister of […]
May 27, 2025
The Dutch railroad company NS is going to remove first class in about half of all Sprinter trains to create additional second-class seats. A total of 3,580 additional second-class seats would be involved. According to NS, first class in the sprinter, a train for short travel distances used for stopping services, is only about 10% […]
May 26, 2025
As of yesterday, the British South Western Railway (SWR), which serves more than 200 stations in southern England, is once again in government hands. It is, in fact, the first train company to be nationalized under Labour. The Starmer government called the renationalization of British Rail, which was privatized in 1990, a “new era for […]
May 25, 2025
The bicycle continues gaining popularity in Flanders: 18,5% of Flemish travel by (electric) bicycle. In other words, never has there been so much cycling in Flanders. This is according to the Flemish government’s seventh study on travel behavior in Flanders. By comparison, in the Netherlands, 27% of journeys are made by bicycle. Still, the car […]
May 23, 2025
The Walloon public transport company TEC has put the first full electric bus into service. This happened in Liège. The bus in question is a Mercedes-Benz Citaro. The ambition is to be fully electric by 2045. “With this first 100% e-bus, TEC opens a new chapter in its history: that of a cleaner, quieter and […]
May 19, 2025
The number of fare dodgers at the Belgian public transport company NMBS/SNCB is rising. Last year, nearly 700,000 passengers without tickets were caught red-handed at the railroad company. Sudinfo newspapers have reported the news. This is a remarkable 40% increase compared to 2023, some 200,000 more than two years ago. Impact of tens of millions […]
May 16, 2025
French Bus company BlaBlaCar now offers train tickets on its website and app in addition to its bus and carpool offers. The service is in direct competition with SNCF Connect, the official booking platform of French railroads SNCF, and Trainline, an independent, commercial ticket seller offering tickets from multiple rail companies in Europe, including SNCF. […]
May 14, 2025
From January 2028, the Belgian public railroad company NMBS/SNCB will no longer conduct statutory recruitments. This is stated in the preliminary agreement that the railroad unions ACOD Spoor, ACV-Transcom, and VSOA Spoor reached with Minister of Mobility Jean-Luc Crucke (Les Engagés). From now on, new employees will be recruited by contract, which will eventually lead […]
May 13, 2025
The Danish capital, Copenhagen, wants to raise tourists’ awareness of the need to travel more sustainably. This summer, the city will again use generous incentives to encourage guests to travel and sightsee more sustainably. In response to the climate crisis and general world overtourism, last year’s CopenPay campaign will be extended with more discount offers and […]
May 09, 2025
Flemish Mobility Minister Annick De Ridder (N-VA) wants the public transport company De Lijn to work out a new framework agreement for a planned order of some 30 streetcars for Antwerp. The order is with Spanish rolling stock manufacturer Construcciones y Auxiliar de Ferrocarriles (CAF). The price would suddenly be 1.5 times higher, and the […]
May 08, 2025
Belgian railroad network manager Infrabel is conducting tests using liquid nitrogen and electricity, among other things, to control weeds in and along the tracks. It does so with its Dutch counterpart, ProRail, and the international railroad organization UIC. Both rail network managers are looking for new methods to control weeds on the tracks, although the […]
May 08, 2025
Media House newspapers report that Flemish public transport operator De Lijn received a whopping 87,000 complaints last year, 24,000 more than in 2023. This is the most significant number of complaints De Lijn has ever received in one year. The record number of complaints is mainly due to the new transport plan Hoppin, which the […]
May 06, 2025
The popular self-driving shuttles at the Terhills tourist site in Dilsen-Stokkem and Maasmechelen will disappear from May 26th. The reason? The French technology supplier Easymile, responsible for vehicle production, maintenance, and safety, is stopping its shuttle projects for financial reasons. The ‘Limburgse Reconversie Maatschappij’ (LRM) and its partners, responsible for operating the shuttles, will investigate […]
May 05, 2025
Belgian public railroad company NMBS/SNCB may soon collect a bonus for last year’s performance. According to its publication, ‘Realizations and Key Figures 2024,’ this is because it performed better than agreed upon in several areas. Built into the public service contract between the federal government and NMBS/SNCB is a bonus-malus system of up to 5 […]
April 29, 2025
Flemish public transport operator De Lijn has presented its first electric articulated bus in Leuven. By July this year, 109 articulated e-buses will be in service in Flanders. The buses are part of a framework agreement under which De Lijn can order up to 500 such vehicles from the Italian industrial vehicle manufacturing company Iveco. […]
April 28, 2025
It was quite a saga, but the new streetcar in Liège went out for its first official public run this morning. After two months of testing on the new rails, the streetcar switched to its commercial speed of 20 k/h. The streetcar, renamed “the white snake” by designer Michel Redolfi, and the new mobility network […]
April 24, 2025
Belgian Mobility Minister Jean-Luc Crucke (Les Engagés) has reached a preliminary agreement with rail unions on issues including personnel management, legal responsibilities, and the modernization of staff status. The agreement with representatives of HR Rail, NMBS/SNCB, Infrabel, and the unions ACOD Spoor, ACV Transcom, and VSOA Spoor may not be enough to also avert next […]
April 23, 2025
Today, mobility platform Bolt celebrates the third anniversary of its taxi booking service in Belgium. Bolt was launched in February 2022 and now offers its service in Antwerp, Brussels, Ghent, Bruges, Namur, and more. Three years after it arrived in Belgium, Bolt draws a very positive balance that reflects the image of urban mobility in […]
April 18, 2025
The Flemish public transport company De Lijn has long planned to deploy self-driving buses, but the plans just don’t seem to be getting off the ground. For example, a pilot project was underway in Leuven. However, the tendering procedure for the framework contract appears to have been put on hold. The ambition to have an […]
April 18, 2025
The Belgian Council of State has suspended the public railroad company NMBS/SNCB’s decision to designate Spanish CAF as the preferred bidder for purchasing new trainsets. The decision came after co-bidder Alstom went to court to ask for it to be suspended. The Council judges that NMBS/SNCB has not been sufficiently transparent in its decision. As […]
April 17, 2025
Staff of the Belgian public railroad company NMBS/SNCB were victims of aggression 2,102 times in 2024. That’s about 200 fewer reports of aggression compared to the previous year, but it still equates to staff being victims of aggression an average of nearly six times a day. The figures are down from 2023 and 2022 (1,900 […]
April 14, 2025
As already known, the Belgian railroad company NMBS/SNCB must save over 675 million euros from the new government. But now the business newspaper L’Echo/De Tijd is also publishing more detailed figures on what those savings must look like year by year. This year, the railroads must save 50 million euros from the De Wever government. […]
April 11, 2025
The Belgian public railroad company NMBS/SNCB is introducing a flexible parking subscription, an initiative that aims to respond mainly to commuters who regularly work from home and thus do not take the train to work every day. With this, NMBS/SNCB wants to capitalize on the success of telecommuting, which is now well established in the […]
April 10, 2025
Belgian private drivers are avoiding electric vehicles. They cite cost, lack of infrastructure, and doubts about sustainability, even as the country embraces broader changes in mobility trends. According to the 2025 Mobility Barometer by insurer Europ Assistance, 62 percent of respondents say their next car won’t be electric, a 10 percent increase from last year. […]
April 09, 2025
Not a week goes by now, so to speak, without a new competitor to the Eurostar being announced. Now, the Italian rail group Ferrovie dello Stato also wants to run high-speed trains between London and Paris via the Channel Tunnel by 2029. It has planned an investment of one billion euros for this purpose. It […]
April 09, 2025
The Auditor of the Council of State advises to suspend the decision of Belgian public railroad company NMBS/SNCB on the order of new trains. This is what the public broadcaster VRT writes on its website. NMBS/SNCB chose Spanish company CAF as the preferred bidder to build hundreds of new trains, an order worth 3.4 billion […]
April 08, 2025
Ombudsrail, the Belgian ombudsman service for rail passengers, was contacted 4,154 times last year, up 7.6% from 2023. On that basis, 1,089 files were opened, accounting for 2,344 complaints – one file can contain several complaints. Seven out of ten complaints in this regard were filed in Dutch. Together with even older complaints, just over […]
April 07, 2025
French train builder Alstom is planning a significant expansion in France. The company plans to invest 150 million euros and recruit at least 1,000 people this year. The investments and hiring are coming to meet the increased demand for high-speed trains. The plan is to start a new production line at Alstom’s Valenciennes plant. At […]
April 03, 2025
The almost free subscriptions the previous Walloon government introduced for public transport were not an unqualified success. More season tickets were sold, but validation on the buses and trams decreased. “If this price reduction does not encourage the use of public transport, where is the problem?” Minister of Mobility, François Desquesnes (Les Engagés), wonders. The […]
April 02, 2025
National railway company NMBS/SNCB is not responding to the request from traveler interest group TreinTramBus to compensate season ticket holders for the many strikes of the past weeks with a ‘Sorry Pass.’ TreinTramBus had requested railway company NMBS/SNCB to compensate season ticket holders for February and March with a Sorry Pass for all the recent […]
April 01, 2025
“Eurostar’s London depot could accommodate additional trains if necessary.” With a simple phrase, British rail regulator ORR has cleared the way for more Eurostar competition. Virgin, the group around British billionaire Richard Branson interested in operating a train link between London and continental Europe, said that it welcomed the “green light for competition.” Battle for […]
March 31, 2025
This weekend, the Belgian railroad manager Infrabel slid a 750-ton railroad tunnel under the tracks at the station of Wezemaal, near Rotselaar in Flemish Brabant. The concrete element, 18 meters long, 14 meters wide, and almost 4 meters high, was placed under the tracks via a special metal chute. The tunnel should provide a better […]
March 31, 2025
Belgian public railroad company NMBS/SNCB posted an operating profit, i.e., before interest and tax costs, of 131.6 million euros last year, down 10.6 million euros compared to 2023. The number of passengers rose slightly in 2024 to 245.1 million. “This is an increase for the third year in a row, but the return of commuters […]
March 26, 2025
Residents, commuters, and visitors to the city of Liège will have to be more patient if they want to use the new streetcar. The inauguration has been postponed again, this time to April 28th. The Walloon public transport company TEC indicates that several technical problems remain, so it has a new start date. Streetcars have […]
March 25, 2025
After Virgin Trains and Spain’s Evolyn, another candidate has come forward with plans to run passenger trains through the Channel Tunnel: British Gemini Trains. There is no timescale yet for when Eurostar’s new potential competitor plans to run services between London and continental Europe, particularly Paris and Brussels, although other media are talking about 2029. […]
March 24, 2025
Transdev Nederland, one of the Netherlands’ public transport operators, runs buses nationwide. It has chosen Dutch bus manufacturer VDL to deliver 42 Citea e-buses for the Hoeksche Waard/Goeree-Overflakkee (HWGO) concession. Meanwhile, the last Van Hool buses after the bankruptcy are auctioned. Transdev is a French multinational public transport and ambulance company operating in 19 countries. […]
March 21, 2025
North Sea Port, the cross-border port area between Vlissingen (the Netherlands) and Ghent (Belgium), has installed a new jetty with shore power. Ships arriving in Ghent must now dock here. With this investment, North Sea Port strengthens its position as a European sustainable port. The sustainable jetty, located at the head of the Grootdok, is […]
March 20, 2025
Advertisers may have returned, and the value may be valued again at 44 billion dollars, but individuals and companies continue to abandon social media platform X. For example, De Lijn, NMBS/SNCB, TEC, and MIVB/STIB, each with a separate message on the same platform, have stated that they are leaving X. The main reason seems to […]
March 20, 2025
Four scientists from KU Leuven, the University of Ghent, and Transport and Mobility Leuven have concluded that it makes no sense to choose the train instead of the plane for trips within the European Union to emit less CO2. Due to the European emission ceilings, someone else will emit the saved CO2 anyway. The Emission […]
March 19, 2025
The new federal government wants to explore the idea of driverless trains and see if trains without a train attendant, the so-called ‘one-man car,’ can be done. This is according to the policy statement of federal Mobility Minister Jean-Luc Crucke (Les Engagés). The proposal is remarkable. On the one hand, it may help bring down […]
March 18, 2025
De Lijn’s buses and streetcars were involved in a combined 23 accidents per day last year, a record average. Overall, in 2024, buses were involved in 7,207 accidents, and streetcars in 1,191. So, the numbers are on the rise, as are the number of victims. The figures also show that De Lijn is often not […]
March 17, 2025
A recent report indicates that London’s air quality has significantly improved since the introduction of the Ultra-Low Emission Zone, an area where polluting vehicles are banned or must pay a congestion charge to enter. Annual roadside NO2 concentrations across the capital have been nearly halved (49%) between 2016 and 2023, while preliminary figures indicate London […]
