Brussels Airport (BRU) infrastructure: future

[teach]

The building between the Skyhall and the terminal.

The start of demolish and to rebuild a new one is not known at this moment. It's in the pipeline, let me call it like this.

Is this the building with the green roof on Google maps?

[Atlantis]

Yes that one + the area around

[Conti764]

The final decision is taken. Concourse A will be extented. The tendering will start next year.
It will be a huge project!!

There is a fairly recent satpicture of BRU on Google Earth, conveniently placing two JAF widebodies (767/787) next to each other.

I have cropped those two widebodies and copied them to where A-pier West will be raised and I must say the expansion is even more impressive then I figured... If 14 widebodies is still the plan, they'll have to move taxiway J a few hundred meters out of the way, probably demolish two buildings between the tunnel to Brucargo and appron 6 to rebuild taxiway J at this place.

The advantage is that is still leaves room to expand on appron 6 might this be necessary...

[Established02]

Are there plans to add a new exit lane and possibly a new taxi way North of 25R in order to make the new DHL site more accessible?

[Atlantis]

Some new projects: some are really huge:

1) the trainstation under the airport will be extended from the current 3 tracks to 10 tracks!! Passengers from North of France and Germany will become important to this as trains will come from those regions. Negotiations will start. Start of the project is not know at this moment.

2) Tramline from NATO to the airport will be build for sure and is confirmed. Tramline from Heysel to the airport is postponed as the city of Vilvoorde is doing difficult.

3) In April of this year, start of the new Summer season in aviation, the second Discount parking on Brucargo will be open.

4) By the end of this year there will be a new "Staff route only" to the airport. This will keep the employees on the airport away from the passengers who are driving to the airport. This means that staff will not use anymore the fly over to the airport. The new route at the end of this year will be a tentative one but will be final soon after. Keep in mind that Deloitte, KPMG and a third tenant will come in 2016 and 2017 to the airport.

[crew1990]

Some new projects: some are really huge:

1) the trainstation under the airport will be extended from the current 3 tracks to 10 tracks!! Passengers from North of France and Germany will be come important to this as trains will come from those regions. Negotiations will start. Start of the project is not know at this moment.

I really think that a mixed of high speed train can be very benefic for the airport as the biggest city are all around. Would be nice to see some direct high speed connection to Lille, Luxembourg, Paris, Strasbourg, Dusseldorf, Cologne, Amsterdam and even London (but will be more difficult).

Having as well Brussels Airport connected without changes to the biggest city of Belgium, Ostend, Ghent, Liege, Namur, Mons and Charleroi would be great too.

[Conti764]

Some new projects: some are really huge:

1) the trainstation under the airport will be extended from the current 3 tracks to 10 tracks!! Passengers from North of France and Germany will be come important to this as trains will come from those regions. Negotiations will start. Start of the project is not know at this moment.

From three to ten tracks is a huge expansion indeed I wonder how things will work operationally, because expansion is only possible in one direction, away from the airport building and both tunnels are now constructed in line with the first two platforms. This implicates a fairly large crossing of the to be build yards at both sides of the station...

2) Tramline from NATO to the airport will be build for sure and is confirmed. Tramline from Heysel to the airport is postponed as the city of Vilvoorde is doing difficult.

Finally some logic... I assume the old trianstation will become the tramstation...?

[ezis_bis]

Some new projects: some are really huge:

1) the trainstation under the airport will be extended from the current 3 tracks to 10 tracks!! Passengers from North of France and Germany will be come important to this as trains will come from those regions. Negotiations will start. Start of the project is not know at this moment.

Wow! Just wow..
In all honestly, this is excellent news. Though I like the recent improvements as well, but it can get very busy there at peak times.
Train is an excellent option in Belgium. And usually I feel a bit disappointed when people insist on picking me up by car when I need to be in BRU, there's such a car addicition.

Regardless, apart from the mentioned National trunk lines, and the International lines which are already mentioned, I hope there will also be suburban connections.

Finally some logic... I assume the old trianstation will become the tramstation...?

Where is this one? I have no idea..

[Conti764]

Finally some logic... I assume the old trianstation will become the tramstation...?

Where is this one? I have no idea..

Therr is more info on page 12

[ezis_bis]

page 12

Very nice and interesting!
Well done
In 2 weeks I am in BRU again, I will try figure to take a look, time permitting

[sn26567]

1) the trainstation under the airport will be extended from the current 3 tracks to 10 tracks!!

That's more than Schiphol, or even Brussels Central. Are so many tracks really needed, even assuming an international expansion?

2) Tramline from NATO to the airport will be build for sure and is confirmed. Tramline from Heysel to the airport is postponed as the city of Vilvoorde is doing difficult.

Vilvoorde making it difficult? No surprise. In the past there was a nice rapid tram line (58) from Vilvoorde Centrum to Brussels and further south. Vilvoorde didn't like to have trams in its centre, and the line was converted to much slower buses.

[Atlantis]

1) the trainstation under the airport will be extended from the current 3 tracks to 10 tracks!!

That's more than Schiphol, or even Brussels Central. Are so many tracks really needed, even assuming an international expansion?

2) Tramline from NATO to the airport will be build for sure and is confirmed. Tramline from Heysel to the airport is postponed as the city of Vilvoorde is doing difficult.

Vilvoorde making it difficult? No surprise. In the past there was a nice rapid tram line (58) from Vilvoorde Centrum to Brussels and further south. Vilvoorde didn't like to have trams in its centre, and the line was converted to much slower buses.

Indeed André. Many tracks are needed as this week it was all about mobility. Too much people are coming to the airport by car, but also the nearby countries like The Netherlands, Germany, France, Luxembourg, has to be surved much better by train instead of short flights. But like I mentioned before, Northern France and Germany are in the scope for this.

Tram lines will be indeed very useful too and for sure that I will use them also as it will be much more convenient.

It will be a huge public transport platform: train, tram and busses

[teach]

1) the trainstation under the airport will be extended from the current 3 tracks to 10 tracks!! Passengers from North of France and Germany will become important to this as trains will come from those regions. Negotiations will start. Start of the project is not know at this moment.

Allow me to be VERY skeptical of this. Does the railway company know about these plans, or is this some wild pipedream by BRU management that has little to no chance of ever being realised? Because that's what it sounds like to me. 10 tracks is more than what cities like Leuven and Bruges have, and those are major stations, with multiple rail lines from multiple directions feeding into them. BRU has one line to the north, one to the south. Enormous works that would make the Diabolo project seem like a walk in the park would be needed to expand the rail lines feeding into the airport enough to justify a 10-track station.

I'm sorry, but I don't see this happening. My prediction is that if they're VERY lucky, then five years from now there will be concrete plans to expand the station with one, maximum two extra tracks.

[Boavida]

Maybe they could first do something about the so-called "BUS station". Lots of passenger take a bus, hotel shuttle or coach to and from the airport. The actual "busstation" is an absolute disgrace! It's dark, ugly, broken concrete all over, poor signage (= airport wide problem), cheap benches, when it rains there are puddles all over the place,... Most busstations of small provincial towns look better than this.



Why don't they modernize this?

[Conti764]

Maybe they could first do something about the so-called "BUS station". Lots of passenger take a bus, hotel shuttle or coach to and from the airport. The actual "busstation" is an absolute disgrace! It's dark, ugly, broken concrete all over, poor signage (= airport wide problem), cheap benches, when it rains there are puddles all over the place,... Most busstations of small provincial towns look better than this.



Why don't they modernize this?

If the plans mentioned by Atlantis do get executed, this entire area will be turned into a wharf anyway since it is underneith the busstation that the trainstation would expand making any refurbishment done before those works a waste of money...

[Conti764]

1) the trainstation under the airport will be extended from the current 3 tracks to 10 tracks!! Passengers from North of France and Germany will become important to this as trains will come from those regions. Negotiations will start. Start of the project is not know at this moment.

Allow me to be VERY skeptical of this. Does the railway company know about these plans, or is this some wild pipedream by BRU management that has little to no chance of ever being realised? Because that's what it sounds like to me. 10 tracks is more than what cities like Leuven and Bruges have, and those are major stations, with multiple rail lines from multiple directions feeding into them. BRU has one line to the north, one to the south. Enormous works that would make the Diabolo project seem like a walk in the park would be needed to expand the rail lines feeding into the airport enough to justify a 10-track station.

I'm sorry, but I don't see this happening. My prediction is that if they're VERY lucky, then five years from now there will be concrete plans to expand the station with one, maximum two extra tracks.

I share your thougths about the number of extra tracks, but I don't think Infrabel nor the NMBS would really care if someone else will pay the bill...

However 10 extra tracks is overkill since you are right about capacity of the tunnel. It's kind of useless to squeeze in extra tracks if both directions can't handle more trains. Unless you take a lot of stopage time in consideration since airport bound passenger take more time to (dis)embark due to extra luggage compared to your average commuter.

On the other hand I don't think it will take that much time. Building one extra track was already foreseen in designing the station and if you take a look at the yard hall in northern direction you can easily see they have already kept an expansion in mind.

I can see two or three extra tracks being added in the near future. Enough for an airport...

After edit:

(c) Eurostation

I must admit that in my memory this hall was wider, but you can see room for an extra track on the left hand.

[JOVAN]

The Arrival zone and Bus area looks indeed poor, cheap, un-welcoming, cold, ..
maintenance and cleaning: NOT existing

The amateuristic signage is a severe Belgian disease (same as highways, stations,..).
We need help from abroad to settle this problem.
I suggest we ask help from our Dutch neighbours, masters in logic and customer-friendly thinking.

[Stij]

A few comments...

Although a 10 track railwaystation would be nice indeed with two tracks in each direction for national railway connections and 6 for terminating international high speed trains, I doubt it for 2 reasons:

- cost: I don't believe the space was foreseen in the 80's when the Sheraton was built. and constructing everything under it
- the railway line itself isn't the problem, the level crossings at both ends of the tunnel are because they limit the tunnel's capacity a lot + on the Nossegem side, the tracks connect to the slow tracks instead of the fast ones.

But please, prove me wrong!!!!!

The tram's stop isn't foreseen in the old railwaystation but where the current bus stop is + where DHL currently is as can be seen on page 6 of this PDF https://static.delijn.be/Images/Brabant ... 3-5083.pdf.
If I count well, I count 8 platforms: 4 dead end tram only (Brussels only) and 4 through bus + tram (Tram Brussels to / from Haacht via Airport).
Access to these platforms would be by escalators from the railwaystation: the transportation hub, not only for the airport, but also for all the business parks around it.

Atlantis, could it be these 8 platforms are included in your 10 platforms?

Cheers,

Stij

[ezis_bis]

2) Tramline from NATO to the airport will be build for sure and is confirmed..

Isn't this going to be the STIB/MIVB one?
Just a stretch from the present Eurocontrol line?

Or is this the same as the Brabantnet-project?

I am confused

[Atlantis]

A few comments...

Although a 10 track railwaystation would be nice indeed with two tracks in each direction for national railway connections and 6 for terminating international high speed trains, I doubt it for 2 reasons:

- cost: I don't believe the space was foreseen in the 80's when the Sheraton was built. and constructing everything under it
- the railway line itself isn't the problem, the level crossings at both ends of the tunnel are because they limit the tunnel's capacity a lot + on the Nossegem side, the tracks connect to the slow tracks instead of the fast ones.

But please, prove me wrong!!!!!

The tram's stop isn't foreseen in the old railwaystation but where the current bus stop is + where DHL currently is as can be seen on page 6 of this PDF https://static.delijn.be/Images/Brabant ... 3-5083.pdf.
If I count well, I count 8 platforms: 4 dead end tram only (Brussels only) and 4 through bus + tram (Tram Brussels to / from Haacht via Airport).
Access to these platforms would be by escalators from the railwaystation: the transportation hub, not only for the airport, but also for all the business parks around it.

Atlantis, could it be these 8 platforms are included in your 10 platforms?

Cheers,

Stij

Dear Stij,

Plans were changed during the years. What was proposed a couple of years ago is now different, not entirely, but still. About the trainstation with 10 tracks is indeed in the pipeline and communicated internally. But bear in mind that this will be spread over many years and in phases. Don't expect that next year there will be already 10 tracks. It's not bcs I publish it here that it will be in production next year. It's only to share with you the plans.

You can imagine that a lot of communities, local governments and private companies will be involved and we all know the bureaucracy here in Belgium. Think about the tram line how long those plans excists already.

Meaning is to create a huge public transport, very modern and renovated (of course), platform with busses, tram and train. To much people take their car and the % in using public transport has to increase. That's why a lot of effort will be done for this.