The Belgian City That Built A Metro Line... And Never Opened It
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- čas přidán 12. 05. 2022
- In the the mid-1980s, the city of Charleroi started building a metro line. But with half the stations already completed, and the track and signals already in place, construction suddenly stopped. The line never opened. What happened? And how much of it is still there? I travelled to southern Belgium to find out...
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FURTHER READING
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IMAGE CREDITS
Charleroi 1960s Metro Plan by Nico Brussels and Dirk Hillbrecht - commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi...
Belgian Parliament Building by Oakenchips - commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi...
Waffle Iron by James Starmer - commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi...
Amsterdam Metro Map by Alargule - commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi...
Rome Metro Map by Junge30 - commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi...
Charleroi Airport by Fernandopascullo - commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fi...
Nice video, however there's even more crazy backstory as to why that one line never opened, even when it was fully completed. It had to do with Charleroi having two different transit agencies at the time, one for regional and one for urban transit. The lines to Châtelet (and Soleilmont) were built by the regional operator, while the rest of the network including the core section was built by the urban operator. You can clearly see where both sections met, since they couldn't even agree on which sides the trains had to run (!) so they built a crossover halfway the line (clearly visible at 1:44). When the line was finally finished, they were in disagreement about how to operate it since they didn't discuss it beforehand, and so the line couldn't open. The opening was postponed again and again, but eventually an agreement was never met... I can't think of a more Belgian story than this.
Oh wow this makes the story even better! Brilliant comment, thank you Squizie3 :) Do you mind if I pin this?
@@TheTimTraveller I don't mind, I would love it ;)
@@Squizie3 you mean you don't mind (you are ok with Tim pinning the comment)? Just to make it clear :)
I was literally going to say this is so like Belgium from the title alone but the backstory makes it even more wonderfully brilliant (it's a shame it hasn't opened though).
@@Squizie3 done! If I get time next week, I might even make a quick bonus video JUST to talk about the crossover - in which case you'll get a credit of course 👍
As a Belgian, i always explain the dutch and french speaking parts as an old married couple that always argues among themselves, until you ask why they don't simply split up. Then they suddenly unite and will argue with you instead.
As a Dutch person this works the same with Flemish people, we are always arguing but whenever someone mentions Wallonia we are best mates just so we can hate on Wallonians
@@TST0475 How come Dutch people even care about Wallonia ? I understand Flemish-Wallonians rivalry for historical, cultural, economical or whatever reasons, but is this Dutch-Wallonians rivalry only rely on a Dutch-Flemish solidarity based on a common language ?
(naive question from France)
@@ogamiitto8627 It has to do with the differences between Dutch Speaking and French Speaking people, in The Netherlands when someone is foreign we immediatly switch to English, same as in Flanders, where they also immediatly need to switch to French if they meet a Wallonian.
But Wallonians (same as a lot of French people) are quite stubborn and keep speaking French, even if someone doesnt know French. When i visited Wallonia back in 2019, even 20-30 year old people i met were too stubborn to move to another language than French, even though everyone gets Dutch, French and English in school.
This really gets on Dutch peoples nerves, who like to switch immediatly whenever they need to.
This mixed with some Wallonian towns being like Charleroi (another good example is Liege), being very poor and ugly cities after the fall of the steelworks and other industrial companies et cet. makes Wallonia have quite a bad reputation.
@@ogamiitto8627 Good question. As a Dutch person I can't say I care about Wallonia. Although I remember passing through Charleroi by train about 25 years ago and thinking that it was grimmest city I ever saw and couldn't imagine that anyone would want to live in that city by choice. Do French people care about Wallonia? Is there a rivalry or brotherhood?
@@TST0475 sadly its even worse now, Dutch is not even mandatory anymore in alot of schools in wallonia, then again the people I know in flanders would rather switch to English than French if they meet a walloon, or more likely try to avoid them in the first place
A few years ago, my partner and I were driving around Belgium. We went to Charleroi and before finding somewhere to stay, we promptly got quite lost (not realising before leaving the UK that my satnav didn't work in Europe). We pulled up outside a building that didn't look like a hotel, yet had the word 'hotel' written on it. We popped in, to see if we could stay. It turned out to be a homeless hostel. The lady who ran it, Lorie, explained we couldn't stay, but said she knew of a cheap hotel. She tried to explain its whereabouts, but upon realising how complicated the set of directions would be, she popped into her office and gave us her satnav on the promise that we returned it the next day. An incredibly kind gesture to lend two strangers in good faith something that probably cost a penny or two. We used it to find the hotel, then the following day we went to the coal mine museum (which was fascinating), and the glass museum and then returned it to the hostel, much to the surprise of the majority of the residents, but not to Lorie! Sometimes people remind you that there is kindness in the world! We really could have used that satnav when we were trying to leave Gent.... Jeez!
🤣🤣🤣
Sounds like it was a "few DECADES ago" rather than years since who needs a whole ass navigation when we have Google maps, etc.?
@@Shifftee it probably depends on the data cost? I mean: google maps eat data (and phone battery) as crazy. So if OP planned to travel with navigation a lot - then navigation could be better. Also: in my country (quick research - in Belgium too) there is fine for using your phone driving a car, unless you have holder/stand (no idea how to name it in english) - and installation of it just for a trip, when you already have navigation is extra cost and time
@@MaraMara89 You don't neeed data for google maps. It operates using GPS much like regular satnavs, all you have to do in advance is tell the application to download the maps of the region you're visiting so you have offline information.
In the event you already have a satnav and its mounting mechanism, and do not have a mount for your phone, the satnav is likely more practical, but the accuracy of Google Maps is on par if not superior to what most reasonably priced satnavs sport. So, there's very little reason to buy a standalone satnav outside of diversifying.
@@Shifftee Um... not everyone has access to mobile data when abroad
I’m flemish and went to charleroi once and it was an absolutely surreal experience. It feels like a dystopian deserted theme park when you take the tram through the old mining structures. The city has a truly fantastical atmosphere.
Well, that is if you think horrifyingly ugly, deserted, grey and poor is “fantastical”
Charleroi would be so good for a movie. A lot of potential
@@Silence_stp : Charleroi is really amazing for "drama" or "thriller" movie. For exemple, you got "LES CONVOYEURS ATTENDENT" with Benoit Poelvoorde, or "TUEURS" with Olivier Gourmet! Recently, the Rap Music clip "22" by NEKFEU was also shoot in Charleroi. Take a look and hit me with your feedback :-)
Onder DE brug daar is het altijd een show in die auto's.
(Prostituees zitten daar i auto's)
En nu hangt Charleroi net als bijna heel Wallonië aan een Vlaams uitkeringeninfuus, maar Nederlands spreken willen ze niet. Vlaanderen wees slim; dump Wallonië!
If I were a resident of Charleroi and I had to walk past those unused subway stops every day to work since the 1970s, my rage would be incandescent by 2022.
That's my daily routine every f*cking days.
I'd be mad too, mostly because after walking every day since the 70s I'd be at Belgian retirement age and after 50 years I think I would finally deserve at least one day off.
@@igrim4777 I bet that the delay would be into the years haha.
Singapore also built some train stations that were opened only ~10 yrs later for various reasons e.g. Woodleigh was built in what was then mostly forest & a colombrium between 2 other stations that were rather far apart, together with other stations along the same line that were in more populated areas, probably as there'd be more economies of scale building more stations in 1 go rather than building 1 station on the same line much later than others. However ~20yrs later the forest is now replaced by public housing. On the other hand, construction of our fully-elevated Punggol LRT (which is more like an APM) continued as originally scheduled I think even as the town it served has its development delayed by the Asian Financial Crisis in 1997. Perhaps to make up for lost time, after that the gov't concentrated much of the new house-building (public housing houses 85% of our population) in that town, & the stations eventually opened, except for 1 that'll probably open ~2030 when a new university campus is built beside it. A side effect of such concentration though is that some of our older towns now have a greying population as their families' children increasingly move to where the gov't has concentrated new housebuilding at, when they grow up. So some of thost towns' facilities e.g. Tg Pagar & Buona Vista public swimming pools have closed due to decreasing patronage.
You'd have shot yourself by now, because you live in Charleroi...
That metro line is the least of your problems.
Fun fact! There’s a place in Australia also called Charleroi, it was renamed after the Belgian city after Australian troops were stationed there following World War One and really enjoyed the hospitality. Charleroi, Australia has only 73 residents and does not have a metro.
Sounds like they could move two or three metro stations from Charleroi(Belgium) there :P
Or might have one, should check it out
Interesting, I live close to a Charleroi in Pennsylvania, US. Looks like it was founded by Walloons in 1890 and now has a population of 4120. They also don't have a metro :)
We should start a crowdfunding campaign to give Charleroi, Australia it’s own Metro.
@@conepictures perhaps a single Subway would be more than enough
I am so impressed as a foreigner (sorry maybe you have Belgian nationality) the research and the time investissement you have put in this video to show us more about Charleroi metro but also about Belgium in general. You did a amazing job, and as a Belgian, I just want to thanks you !
Thank you! That's lovely to hear :)
"Carolo" here (how we call us, the citizen of Charleroi) : I quite never liked our metro/tram but in the same time seeing this video gave me nostalgia and made me laugh. I don't live in that town anymore but I always quite like it, the coal/desert/ghost urban vibe... And it's always fun to see it from a stranger perspective.
Belgium is quite a strange country, but I will never trade it for an other one. We are like a dysfunctional family that loves each of us anyway haha
It sure is a strange country, if it wasn't officially a country then most would view it as two regions of somewhere else.
The story of the Liège metro is its own appaling absurdity: they did start digging, went as far as purchasing the trains, but the tunnels were not water proof. They had to be filled back up and thus the Liège Metro was stillborn.
Belgium is a treasure trove of catastrophic policy mistakes.
You should see the Mexico City metro, recently an overhead line collapsed and killed 20+ people
this isn't a belgium problem only d'oh, there are projects like this all over the world
@@wardwyseur But in Europe Belgium has a monopoly on them lol.
Corruption and incompetence at their finest.
@@wardwyseur Absolutely true, but Belgium definitely is a special case because of the fact it's divided in 3 different language regions (Dutch, French, and German, although the German region is so tiny you can pretty much just ignore and only focus on the first 2), who absolutely seem to hate each other's guts and do their utmost best to make the other's life as difficult as possible, hence why nothing ever get's (succesfully) done in Belgium. Although as a Dutchman I understand the next bit my come across as very ignorant or even arrogant, but I seriously wonder if Belgium wouldn't just be better off being split up in 2 and having Flanders join the Netherlands while Wallonia joins France. Or option 2, disband the 3 different language regions and just create 1 single country so the whole country is forced to work together and (hopefully) no longer able to sabotage the other's projects and plans.
Belgian here, your explanation was spot on. Charleroi has a pretty poor reputation. As a former coal mining and steel industry city, it was quite literally black and grim. It still has a lot of unemployment. It is however undergoing a strong transformation as you've seen in this video. So I agree with the advice to visit in a few years time.
As someone who has spent a lot of time in the coal region of Pennsylvania, it's sadly interesting to see the similarities between Charleroi and places like Scranton. Hopefully someday Scranton will see the same kind of transformation!
@@bonecanoe86 Europe is short on land so regeneration will always come eventually.....
@@TheJmsbrown Distances are also short, which helps as well. 45 minutes driving from Brussels, or 1 hour by train.
It still seems unreal that that at least that Neuville station isn’t used given that it’s right next to those blocks of flats.
@Eric Darchis i really hope they will modernize the buildings already there. To keep some of the past alive. And maybe mix some modern into the region.
I myself am from northern Netherlands (not north Holland, really fuck that province) and I tell you it can work great. You just need to attract the right crowd and companies to blast the building into 2026 (as I'm sure it would take for local politics to sort thier shit out and actually start). It looks like there is a lot of potential. Especially when metro 5 finally gets completed.
Also they could attract modern companies . Of they fix thier internet rates and drop data caps. It would also attract just normal folk. (Not sure tho what Is P's still have home data caps, but here we would burn thier HQ's down for that kind of BS). But with everything up2date I can see good potential in the region. Even with the coal/steel past that's pretty shit.
You also would need a good train station. And connection to parts where there is high quality schooling (international) something like the HSL (NS NL)
I truly think it can work out great. But it will take time.
As a Dutch living very close to the Belgian border (so I've visited Belgium (Flanders in particular) a lot), I've always been amazed with some things that are only possible due to the odd situation there between Flanders and Wallonia.
But I never imagined it could lead to something like this.
You live in Brussels?
@@dark_nightwing_xl2797 I think I made it clear I live in the Netherlands and Brussels lying in Belgium (even being the Belgian capital), I guess that would make it easy to guess the answer is "no".
Does the wealth of Flanders and more poverty stricken Wallonia also shock you?
@@jeff4362 "Shock" is the wrong word, but I've always known there's a huge gap between Flanders and Wallonia. And not exactly being rich myself (on the contrary) I'm not that easily shocked anymore. But I've always wondered about how it is possible. Now the situation between Northern and Southern Italy appears to be far more out of balance than the situation between Flanders and Wallonia and has always amazed me as well.
Being a Belgian with a part of my family from Charleroi, I was really surprised by the quality of your presentation. impressive. well done. I even learnt quite a lot of things.
Speaking of colossal wastes of money and horror stories: A few years from now, Tim standing next to an abandoned industrial site. "Hello and Guten Tag! It is spring 2029, and I'm in the city of Greifswald in northeastern Germany. And today we're exploring the 1234 km, 10 billion Euro pipeline that was fully completed but not opened. Fully completed but not opened? What's the story there? Where does this pipeline go? Well, ..."
Sehr gut!
Is it Nordstream 2 you’re talking about?
@@mctavishsoap3815 yes
I allways wonder how they will speak in the future about the hunderts of thousand of "Verkehrsversuchen" in germany, where they spend million of Euros to change mostly fully operatable and good streets in bicycle friendly roads by reducing lanes. Which often ends in a big mess of traffic jams, frustrated people and no real jump forward for anyone.
Europe is desperately short of gas..
"Hi, we have a new pipeline that will solve the problem instantly."
"No thanks, we like our industries shutting down and being cold in our apartments. Go away!"
Stupid politicians
As a Belgian, your view of Flanders and Wallonia as squabling siblings is pretty spot on I think.
The divorsed couple still living together analogy is closer to the point.
@@WolfJustWolf Let me guess, flemish and leaning towards the nationalist-side of politics?
Flanders and Wallonia are as close or separated as you want to see them. Sure, the waffle-iron-politics shouldn't come back and Wallonia didn't recover well from their industrial crisis, but they seem to have woken up while Flanders is falling asleep when it comes to going with the times and adapting to the future, and if Flanders doesn't wake up soon the coin will do a full 180 flip once again.
The Flandern government is too busy saying Flanders funds the rest of Belgium and fighting the "left-wing" (not really) federal government to see Wallonia is catching up fast. The main problem is that 90% of the people don't even know which government decides what, let alone know what their vote truly means, they just pick a party that shouts what they think the loudest without doing any research, and vote for it on every level from city to Europe, resulting in barely workable governments that actually represent few people and taking decisions nobody actually wanted when they used the red pencil on a string. The truth is every single party, even the forever-opposition extremes, wants to keep the system as it is even if it means driving it into the ground as long as they are the ones being spared from the consequences. This is true in most of the world, it's just more extreme in a tiny country with 6 governments who can barely make any decisions by themselves...
The squabling siblings/divorced couple is a view nationalists like, the regular folks don't give a single fuck tbh
@@Candisa The transfer of money in and of itself isn't really a political talking point anymore, and even then, wealth transfers from wealthy Flemish cities also go to poorer Flemish areas such as Limburg. While this is very much a De Wever talking point, he is right when he says that Belgium currently has devolved so significantly that our national identity can be considered tenuous at best. I think the moment that really hammered that home is when we decided to devolve education to the communities.
Either we grow back together, continue in this between state or take devolvement to its natural conclusion. Also, I'm not exactly sure how Wallonia is overtaking Flanders economically again. It's not as ruined as it was in the late 20th century sure, but Flanders got through the door of the information and service economy first, and has since comfortably nestled itself as the established go-to region in this country, the one that has the important harbours as well. With the exception of Walloon Brabant most of Wallonia's still not up to par with most of Flanders.
@@retro2103 I'm a Belgian national and I absolutely think that Belgium has been on a path to self-destruction for at least the last 10 years, tangibly. The lack of competition, bad quality of services and many other infrastructural problems is a ticking time bomb. Wonder what happens in the next couple of decades. : o )
Brilliant video, love the style and informative content and the tongue in cheek style! Keep doing them! Hugely enjoyable. 😊
That is super,thanks. I watched your earlier video on this amazing vehicle and never imagined you would actually be able to see this grand old lady .The restoration by the dedicated enthusiasts is an extra bonus and good luck to the team.
As a Belgian let's put it like this : "Everybody is in charge, but nobody is responsible"
For exemple, during Covid early outbreak, we had 9 (NINE!) different Ministers of Health at the same time (due to belgian federalism), each of whom had a saying on Health matters. They were battling to know who had to decide. But there after, none of them was responsible for failures.
That sounds so similar to Germany. During Covid, each of the 16 states had their own guidelines. That lead to a lot of confusion because regulation varied greatly - I remember in Berlin, you had to wear an FFP2 mask in buses and subways, but in the regional trains (which cross state lines) a medical mask was enough. Eventually the central government issued a new law (Infektionsschutzgesetz) in March 2022 which gave them more power to issue regulations, but the states are still responsible for exerting that power.
Did u say *NINE* 👀?
Bro, and I thought that "our 5 health ministers might seem like a shame for 'developed' countries" 🤣🤦♀️🤦♂️🤦...
Regards from 😎🇪🇨🤙
@@basswarnow That wasn't the whole story. Actually we 17 health ministers.
1 Federal and 16 ministers of health for each state. Still depending on infection rates different rules were implemented depending on each city.
@@basswarnow You should have seen the US in 2020, where we had 50 states, each with different COVID regulations. Some went full in with masks and quarantines, while others denied that COVID even existed. Throw in a President who was advocating an anti-parasite medicine used to treat livestock as a panacea for COVID, a quack claiming that all diseases are due to people mating with the devil, and a portion of population predisposed to believe conspiracy theories, each one nuttier than the next, and the level of madness goes off the scale.
They flew to a meating abroad with 4 planes also...
What is more 'fun' is that the local rail enthusiasts semi-regularly run train tours onto the unfinished branch where the tracks are complete. For 40 years those tracks have been maintained enough that trains CAN run on them. If you hunt around you can probably find pictures of these tours. I can only assume there is some legal reason the tracks have to be maintained.
If there's any chance of needing them in any sort of medium term, it's generally cheaper to maintain tracks with no use (or next-to-no use) than it is to tear them out and put them back in again.
@@stmisbehavin662 near the end of the 20th century some American railroads had double track on some routes where traffic had decreased to the point where they were only using one track. So when they added new single track other places, they removed the unused rails and moved them to the new lines. I assume they left some parts as sidings and put in switches so trains going opposite directions could pass, but that arrangement limits the length of some of the trains to the length of the shortest siding on a line. Scheduling trains based on their length and the length of sidings would get to be complicated. Couldn't have two trains come up to a siding where both are too long for it.
But various factors lead to increasing traffic on some of the lines where they'd removed half the rails. So the railroads were whining about needing financial support to put *new* rail back onto the lines they'd taken it from. If they'd bought new rail for the new lines they would've saved money by not needing to buy more expensive rail to replace what they'd foolishly moved.
@@greggv8 American railroads had an extra incentive to single-ify their double track - they were taxed more for double track lines, and in that context it made better sense. I'm pretty sure this doesn't apply in Charleroi.
@@greggv8 The Cambrian Railways regularly used to pass two trains on a single line using passing loops that were shorter than either train. It can be done, but it's a shunter's nightmare.
@@davidjones332 how. One train longer simple, but both?
As a Belgian living near Charleroi, I think you've understood the situation quite well. And also about that waffle-iron politics, there's an example that illustrates this perfectly. Just take a look at the map showed at 4:00, you see those two small areas that are both in the opposite side they belong to. So the one at the top left of the linguistic border is Comines and one upon a time, it belonged to Flanders, but most of the people there spoke French, so Wallonia asked if they could get this part back as most of the people there felt Waloon and not Vlaams, so Flanders accepted to give them this parted then gently asked "Can we get this other part that's on your side of the border but some people there speak dutch, please ". That other part on the bottom right of the linguistic border is Fourons and belongs now to Flanders. That's the perfect example of the waffle-iron politics. I also have to add that you've done a great work finding those stations, as a native from charleroi I was never able to find them even tought I looked everywhere.
I am from Brussels and it's the first time I see a video explaining so simply and effectively the complicated situation of Belgium :) so thank you haha !
Belgian person here! The moment you said "the short answer: it's belgian politics" I literally laughed out loud because that's so typical Belgium. Anyways, I think it's cool that your pronunciation of the cities and stations is pretty spot on! Most English speaking people sound very funny when they try to say 'Charleroi', but you nailed it!
did you enjoy his punchy "bonjour" to every stranger he met?
Imagine Brad Pitt saying Charleroi with his Inglorious Bastards accent.
This is one of the main reasons why Belgium is as complicated as it is today. It was not just ghost metro systems, but all kinds of useless infrastructure works like bridges and highways that would lead to nowhere.
I believe there was a journalist at the time who would every year publish a journal keeping track of all the useless works that had been added to the list to make a point about how public money was being wasted.
Another fine example is that one of those useless highways finally found a use recently to temporarily store all the waste from the massive flooding in Wallonia.
You can see this show about the public funds being spoiled on youtube czcams.com/video/0ZGkfWdsLLw/video.html It was really famous when the show was broadcasted.
Journalist was late Mr Defossé. It was a Sunday prime time part on the news called "Chronicles of the useless works". Always presented with a lot of humor.
czcams.com/video/0ZGkfWdsLLw/video.html
Usually it's a good bet to invest in infrastructure. Back then it was Belgian workers who built that metro. And even though there were actually a lot of 'useless work' that are constantly highlighted. We also built and maintained a very huge road infratructure that is lit at night and can be seen from the moon. It also makes Belgium a very big transit hub in northern Europe.
"LES TRAVAUX INUTILES" Les vidéos de Jean-Claude Defossé sont sur le site "RTBF auvio".
I am from Charleroi and thank you for that vidéo ! Great content. For additional info, the end of the line is in Marketplace of Châtelet, and they did destroyed a lot of homes to allow the building of end line station. Never happened though lol. Thank you again!
Après avoir vécu en Belgique pendant un an, je suis devenu fan de tes vidéos et surtout celle ci. Well researched, well done!
As an viewer from the german speaking part of belgium I for one am very happy you did not forget us :)
Nice to meet you here my mysterious countryman!
As a Flemish person, I have to admit finding your comment felt more like running accros a mythical figure than it should have 😅
İ hope your not the only one who has acces to internet.
Hello Tim ! I'm from Charleroi and you really summed up all the problems about that metro. I would point out that, for a numbers of years, the line 4 wasn't even completed in the 1990's. The last three stations opened in 2013, as well as the closure of the urban loop that all branches goes from. Before that, there was a gap between the metro station "sud" and the metro station "parc". The originals plans to close that loop in the 1990's was to build a bridge over the sambre and the city, cutting through a school (I assure you that was the plan, I went into that school as a student and they called that part of the building the "metro room"). It was scrapped because it would have costed over 3 billion belgian franks at the time (about 74 millions euros in todays money without inflation). Anyway, it was a great video, very instructive even for me. Ho and last bit, as you said, you shouldn't have been in that ghost station, it is forbiden to go in there by the TEC, the operator of the metro. They are used to the occasional visitor and they generaly ask politly, yet firmly, to leave the stations when you are caught
Ah thank you, it's always nice to get comments from people who are actually from the places I visit. And cheers for the extra details! Yeah I hesitated about what date I should give for Line 4... as I understand, it was completed as far as Gilly in the 90s, and put into operation, so that's the date I picked. But you're absolutely correct that technically it wasn't fully completed until 2013. Sometimes even a pedant like me is forced to skip over SOME details :)
@@TheTimTraveller Hahaha, I understand and it's no worry, you can't push all the details in videos but I'm glad that my humble contribution in the comments helps :) And you understood correctly, line 4 (at the time, line 54 and 55) was completed until Gilly in the 90's, the rest was left unfinished but the line went into operation anyway
@@cofeewarior Gee, A student from IND :')
@@simonlacorneille8822 Indeed ;)
@@TheTimTraveller You should make a video on their unfinished highways too.... good stuff there
Loved the video, can't wait to check out more of your content!
This was a fun, entertaining, and informative video! Thanks so much!
This is a pretty standard story: when the money comes from elsewhere, it's easy to find ways to spend it; when it comes from your own pockets, you're a lot more careful with where it goes.
The building contractors just kept on building as long as the money kept flowing. They didn't care if their constructions would ever be used. Of course not everyone could participate in the spoils, you had to be "friends" with certain politicians and/or other influential people . Corruption at its worst.
That's almost the story of my city's metro system, whenever the national government opened its wallet, we could count on transit being built, when it was with our own budget, we pretty much built f'all
I live in California. The liberal government has been building a very large and expensive high speed rail track which will eventually be abandoned because no one wants to ride the stupid thing.
@@guintube Because everyone prefers pollution and climate change to a comfortable ride and reading the paper or a book.
@@guintube I was in San Francisco in the 80s. One set of acquaintances said exactly the same thing about BART. Another set thought it was great. It’s quite possible you belong to the former set, and no matter what happens you’ll stick to your car.
Actually Antwerp also has an unused line, however it is fully underground. Another line was build in the 1980’s and only opened in 2015 (now used by lines 8 and 10 but some stations remain unused)
they are planning to open the unused line in a few years. i don't remember the date
@@lpt2606 2024 I believe...it's apparently almost entirely operational, they just need to build stations (of which there I'll only be 2) and it's done
I sense video material?
@@liamtahaney713 morckhoven/joe english, drink and kerkstraat need to open i think. And then you have the unused metro tunnel under the Kerkstraat?
I think Brussels also had/has unused underground lines?
The end of the E19 to the Ring around Brussels is also clearly different then originally planned.
We had tons of unused metro lines here in Antwerp, on the Flemish side of Belgium. Many people in the city were annoyed, since we literally had trams running through the streets above those lines, that could have run below the ground instead.
In the last 10 years or so, the city has finally started using some of those subway lines. They finished the infrastructure and those trams now run underground in the city centre, after the tunnels lying unused for decades. My husband and I actually live in an area of the city that is now connected with 2 of those previously unused tunnels. When we moved out here 20 years ago, both trams going to this part of the city were still completely above the ground. Then, they finished the infrastructure on one line and started using it, and years later, they did the same with the other one. So they are above the ground in our part of the city, and then go underground as they enter the city centre. It’s a definite improvement, they’re much faster now.
I actually live not so far from Charleroi and it's the first time I've heard about those lines! Thanks so much for this interesting video!
I feel the real bonus irony in the absurdity of the Charleroi metro is that when they finally finished the northern M3 line in the 2010s, it runs *almost* to the really busy airport (a load of low cost airlines use it as a cheaper alternative to Brussels), but *not quite*. Totally bonkers.
LOL probably the taxi unions lobbyed against that.
Oh man... I've used the airport quite a lot to visit my family in Gent and the trip from the terminal to the Charleroi Sud station on those crowded TEC bendy buses rallying at insane speeds through endless roundabouts for 20 minutes is by far the worst part of the whole journey.
I could really use a metro for that trip...
@@osasunaitor hahahahaa
well the closest station is like 100 meters away from the tip of the runway, but it's like 3km away from the terminal
source : the planes go over my house
That airport is pretty much unreachable! :D :D
If you're looking for reasons as to why people would be upset with Waffle Iron Politics: in 1990, 4 years later than the completion of this line, Flanders had 5.74 million residents, and Wallonia 3.24 million (and Brussels 1.69 million). Meaning that for every four Walloon residents, there was SEVEN Flemish persons... And yet the money was supposed to be split exactly the same between them.
I mean, the idea as a whole was never a good solution, seeing as in the mid 20th century wallonia was wealthier than flanders and now the reverse is true, so it always would have disadvantaged one over the other.
@@xander1052 I get the idea, using funding from one to boost the other, but knowing the flemish walloon rivalry, this would never have worked
It is like my country Argentina, Buenos Aires has 15 million people, while other provinces have 4 million to less than 400 thousands. So it’s like 1 -4 residents other states to 15. And the smaller populated provinces have to contribute to the bigger one, for electricity, transport, gas, food, etc.
@@PatricioGarcia1973 When you said Buenos Aires ,I though about the Province of Buenos Aires ,not the agglomeration so I though "No ,it has 18 million people" ,then I looked up on Wikipedia and the agglomeration of Buenos Aires has a population of 15 Million people for 3 830km² while the province of Buenos Aires has 18 Million people on 307 571km² ,so 83.33% of the population of the province of Buenos Aires live on 1.25% of the superficie of Buenos Aires .
32.61% of the population of Argentina live on 0.14% of the superficie of Argentina
Well, in 1830 the Flemish allowed themselves to be buggered by the Walloon industrialists and the clergy. They are still paying the price for that.
Thank you, Tim. You've been very kind, polite and informative about a country that as a citizen, I sometimes love and sometimes hate to live in. For all the bad things you can say about Belgium, I'm glad you see something of interest in its endless stories.
This was a very interesting video, thanks for your excelent work!
This is fascinating. Belgium has so many cool, old cities and towns. Their architecture is second to none, a mix of the Middle Ages and the Industrial Revolution Era, a mix I love.
lol
@RealSweetKid I like the copious use of bricks too. Northern France has a lot of this style as well, especially areas like Artois which historically was part of the lowland Kingdoms.
@@CheapCharlieChronicles speaking of Artois (more the beer stuff) alot of breweries in belgium are older than the country itself,
@RealSweetKid Each part of Europe had it's flavor of renaissance. Particularly the Flemish and Dutch painters of that era had a very typical style, like Breughel and, far ahead of his time, Hieronymus Bosch who was a surrealist, centuries before the word even was invented.
Belgium has many beautiful old cities, full of culture and great architecture. And it also has Charleroi.
Visiting Charleroi is a dream for anyone wanting to visit the post-apocalypse… The airport used to give a creepy authoritarian vibe due to its anti-terrorism additional security point set up on the front entrance embarkation/disembarkation ramp. I never saw it without it, and I can only imagine what it has been like during the beer bug times.
Joking aside, it’s not all that bad, but it could do with some freshening up.
Not the dystopian future we want, but the dystopian future we got.
Reminds me of the metro where I live. There are security checks at every station's entrance set-up like a temporary measure but it has never been removed. Even stations built just last year set them up like a temporary thing.
Beer Bug Times?
I actually kind of enjoy giving a couple of hours to the sketchier/more decrepit parts of a country when I go visit, as a sort of anti-tourism to balance the touristy stuff I see. Like, when I visited Britain, I saw London and the Scottish Highlands, but then on the way down I randomly drove around Leeds for a while.
So when I go to visit Belgium, I'm definitely going to swing through this depressing pit of a town. It definitely has Leeds / Cleveland vibes going on
@@SlackActionBumble I don’t know about Cleveland, but Leeds (if you mean the UK city) is definitely nicer than Charleroi… at least that was the situation five or so years ago. I haven’t been to Leeds for at least that long, and last time I was in Charleroi was before the pandemic.
Greay video Tim, love these hidden gems!
Belgian here! I had no idea Charleroi had an abandoned metro line 😶 Really interesting and well researched video, well done!
I'm reminded of Cincinnati, Ohio, which in 1920 built two miles of tunnels for what should have become a streetcar subway, but abandoned them before any track could be laid. Much of them still exist.
More than that, there was another 7-8 miles of completed surface right-of-way and stations to Norwood that were ready to go except for track, electrical systems, and rolling stock.
If you could a 3-mile streetcar system as a "metro", then Cincinnati now has seven less metro lines than Charleroi was planned to have (and one more than Tampa Bay).
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cincinnati_Bell_Connector
PS: I learned via that article that the local exchange telephone carriers Hawaii of all places is run by the Cincinnati-based telecom company which was awarded the naming rights to Cincinnati's streetcar line. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cincinnati_Bell
Speaking of Cincinnati and mass transit, every time I want to get mad I just think about the twin MetroMoves (would have funded a huge transit expansion) and Stadium (public funds to pay for what would become one of the most expensive football stadiums at the time, for one of the worst teams in the league; poster child for egregious corporate welfare, like this is one of The examples of Why Stadium Deals Are Bad) sales tax ballot measures. Based on how we now have a stadium but not a real regional transit system, I leave it as an exercise to the reader for which one passed and which failed.
(Happy 5/13 day!)
@@andyjay729 The Bell Connector is sadly a failure, and it seems that the city has no real plans to expand the streetcar network in motion whatsoever. I was happy Cincinnati actually finished a transit for once, and still am, but the route was designed by idiot politicians and not competent transit engineers. It's main use is for moving tourists between landmarks than it is for anyone living in Cincy to get around to any place normal people go.
Wonder if it could be finished today?
Ah Charleroi, the least beautiful city in the world.
Have you ever been to Hull?
Slough is up there too
honestly fitting for a place named after a guy whose contribution to history is "repeatedly baffling Christendom by continuing to live"
Swindon and Newport South Wales must go on the list.
Ok @The Tim Traveller maybe it's time to poll for the least beautiful city in the world (or at least Europe)!
You showed so much place I go so often without even knowing this! This is incredible
learned something about my own country, thx for making and sharing
"It's like something from a horror story, if it was a horror story written by an accountant"
Chef's kiss
Ah yes, 'Brussels South Airport'. One of a number of European airports used by budget airlines that are a very long way from the cities they are supposed to serve. Even to the point of the coach service to from the airport to the destination city taking longer than the flight itself (and can even be more expensive) Here's a list:
1. Paris Vatry Airport - 131 miles from Paris.
2. Oslo-Torp Airport - 73 miles from Oslo
3. Munich West Airport - 70 miles from Munich
4. Frankfurt (Hahn) - 68 miles from Frankfurt
5. London Oxford Airport - 61 miles from Central London
6. Stockholm (Skavsta) - 60 miles from central Stockholm
7. Barcelona (Girona) - 58 miles from central Barcelona
8. Barcelona (Reus) - 58 miles from central Barcelona
9. Paris (Beauvais ) - 54 miles from central Paris
10. Dusseldorf (Weeze) - 49 miles from central Dusseldorf
11. Robin Hood Airport - 41 miles from Nottingham
12. London (Stansted) - 40 miles from central London
13. Charleroi (Brussels South) 38 miles from central Brussel
What about London Ashford right beside the seaside
Lots of these in the US, too. The “Manchester-Boston Regional Airport” is in Manchester, NH, about 50 miles from Boston, and not connected with any meaningful public transit.
Robin hood airport has nothing to do with Nottingham. It's in the former Sherwood forest
Robin Hood Airport is not supposed to serve Nottingham, its full name is Robin Hood Airport Doncaster Sheffield as it is intend to serve Doncaster and Sheffield. It is called Robin Hood Airport becasue it is 13 miles from the border of Sherwood Forest and the airbase that was converted into the airport for 59 of its 80 years of operation resided within Nottinghamshire.
@@damiendye6623 As someone from Nottingham, I can confirm that Robin Hood was a Yorkshireman….
Goodness gracious, your sense of humour is a delight. I don't have more than a passing interest in the topics, but your presentation of them is what really sells it for me
Great video! Appreciate your work
Wow! Your video also explains why the "metro" in Antwerp got more funding than it should have in the 1970's. The funds they got from Ghent were also used to build more lines and stations than needed. Currently Antwerp has 7 abandoned partially build underground stations out of 19 in total, of which 4 are planned to finally open in 2024.
They had a weird thing where, when I arrived at Central, the inside staircase was blocked and the outside one just led into what seemed like bicycle parking; but when I came back not even an hour later, the stairs were open and the escalators were running.
@@muncherofpizza Oh yes, this happens all the time. And escalators that only work once in a year or so :D
All this time waiting to escape France to go exploring the world, and you end up in Belgium. Some very good exploring all the same. Thank you for making Belgium seem worth visiting.
I took a train journey through the Ardennes. Spectacular.
Belgium is worth visiting, especially the landscapes are very pretty
Oh come on. Belgium is beautiful, just that Charleroi is not their prettiest jewel.
Gent, Brugges, Leuven, Antwerp, Namur all are beautiful and modern. And the ardennes are incredible
he is saying stay home, it's a construction zone...
@@leonardgibney2997 video: shows the grimmest area of Belgium
you: "thanks for making Belgium seem worth visiting"
🤣
I really enjoy your content.. thank you
Knowing the line is fully abandoned, i think it would be cool to walk down the tracks or maybe get a pump cart or something and ride down, taking the chance to explore ALL the stations.
I thought Madrid Metro, with stations almost finished, with final touches and everything, but no street access because the area was deserted at the time, or Barcelona, with a station completed but never opened due to miscalculations that made crossing the line tunnel directly with the one of another line did it bad. But seeing two stations with all the signage of a functioning station (Chet had even the entrance sign with its name, come on), made Spain look more efficient
Oh I don’t know, Spain has an entire airport that’s been abandoned after hardly any use!
@@ThatRomyKate Berlin Brandenburg want a word
@@el_es
Well, at least it's open and working now
@@mikeblatzheim2797 "working" is a strong word to use here.
Valencia line 2: almost finished in 2011, but unopened because the water table was higher than they thought, and it flooded easily. There are photos of people kayaking in it. They finally opened it as line 10 a month ago.
I hope that during the revival process for the metro lines, they leave as much of the "Art" and also the overall design of the station equipment untouched as possible, or refurbish it without altering the 70's design aesthetics. That would make the metro lines a tourist attraction in itself.
Don't worry, the open lines already carry those aesthetics.
The grafiti will be taken off the floor, benches, doors and parts of the wall where things need to go up. For the rest of the walls, it’s a waste of money.
@@blanco7726 or they sell them as art pieces!
any famous tags?
@@blanco7726 Thank goodness gaffiti looks like shite, and smells of afreakans.
No not the 70s
Great video and explanation of how complicated Belgium is.
You have a very pleasant way of explaining things 👍
As a Belgian, the most surprising thing about this for me is that you went about Charleroi with a camera and didn’t get robbed. 😂
That's what you think, but he cames back only with the memory card 😂
I guess that was supposed to be funny.
Charleroi is a city and as such it’s not more dangerous than Liège, Brussels or even Paris. It’s time to stop bashing Charleroi.
@@medusa66. nah, Charleroi is shite.
@@medusa66. l'humour :D
@@medusa66. Charleroi is a horrible place, full of weirdos, crime and drugs. It's a sore on the face of Wallonia and that's saying a lot. Decades of socialist corruption and mismanagement, the absolute huglyness of the city, everything makes it a national laughing stock. The only reason Belgians from other Areas go to Charleroi is to leave it via the airport.
"Is that an allotment?" 😆😆
I have seen so many images before of this line but never knew the story behind it. Thanks Tim, great as usual.
I enjoyed watching this! Thank you
Thx for the informative video!! 😄 waving from Belgique,!!
Every time I've been to Belgium it always looks like a massive building site. You can see cranes and holes being dug everywhere you look. The only exception is Bruges where you can't see anything due to the fog.
As a Belgian, yeah, sounds about right.
@@Flutters_Shygal I'm glad I'm not alone!
Some say we are born with a building brick in our stomach. So yes, if there's anything we love to do it's constructing and renovating buildings.
@@jlust6660 and it takes forever aswell
> The only exception is Bruges where you can’t see anything due to the fog.
Swap „fog” for „rain”, and you’ve got an accurate description of most of England. The only exception is Basingstoke, which is so strange even the rain doesn’t touch it! 🙃
Hope you'll cover some more Belgian stuff.
The 'Ronquières inclined plane' should be totally up your alley, and could be paired up with the 'Channelbridge van Sart' (Kanaalbrug van Sart).
And they were built for the same political reason as this metro network.
@@anyajenkins4611 Didn't know that one. I should visit these at some point :D
Belgian project are always comedy gold.
Ronquieres is amazing - like something from a 50s sci-fi movie!
@@timbounds7190 Been on a boat up the Strepy-Thieu lift and on one the old ones it replaced. Also visited the inclined plane and watched a barge come up it. It appeared to be full of top soil
As a belgian, I'm from the Flanders btw, I can say you that this is very nice work. Well done!
Great video, keep it up!🕊️
So happy about this Video, combining my passions of metros, underground stations, abandoned stations and your videos into one :D And the allotment joke and all the others are really on point
If you ever come to Germany, in the region I grew up in is the old cannon railway. The mostly abandoned part of the Leinefelde-Treysa-Line is open to walk around on these days. On parts of that line you can also ride a handcar nowadays. Hit me up, if you want to visit. Lots of history on this line as well, should be right up your alley.
It's very rare when I hit "Subscribe" three minutes into a new-to-me channel's video. But your humor and general vibe had me clicking the button. 😁
Hello to you First of all thank you for having visited my city and for having made it discover to the world :) it is true that the lines are just a big deficit for Charleroi especially since they are in this state ( pity) I remember in my childhood the parts of cache cache and seeing it deteriorate from year to year makes me sad, Soleilmont, Sart culpart was in the same state before being renovated and opened but it was ready to use before being degraded by people, the abandoned line 5 just creates a lot of accidents. Hoping that their project is built and that everyone is as it should have been from the beginning.
Thank you have a good evening :)
How do you keep finding such interesting things nobody ever talks about around here?! Love the channel :)
(3:51 Recognized that jingle from Geography Now xD)
Such a lovely detail
3:40 "trying to explain belgium politics, is a bit like trying to run a belgium restaurant - you can't do it without an awful lot of waffle" ... that joke caught me off guard and now there is coffee everywhere
Enjoyed your video tremendously. Especially the humourous presenting. Instant subs.
Really good and informative video!
5:38 I am so here for the SimCity music!!
It's 'Broadway'. ☺
Nice to "see" you too, Paul.
I’m impressed that you were able to sneak in the Geography Now piano riff before explaining the political geography of Belgium.
He did it in some other videos too... (it's time to watch some more Tim Traveler now 😉)
Be glad you've got a metro! Leeds, UK, has a population twice that of Charleroi, yet abandoned its extensive tram system in the 1950s. Plans for a modern light rail system have popped up from time to time during tha past 60 years, but have not yet materialised.
very cool video, thanks mr Tim
As a Dutch person that loves making videos about transport infrastructure, This is really fascinating for me!
Welkom in buurland België, welkom in Karelkoning (Charleroi 😆), waar nederlandstaligen thuis zijn!
"Who won't be happy if I don't mention them"
Tim, du kennst uns zu gut XD Vielen Dank für deine Videos ! Immer ein Vergnügen !!!
Wow, you guys really excist? 😉 love from Flanders!
Wunderbar! Ich habe nach eine Deutsche Nachricht gesucht ^^
most underrated TV program theme so far... had to think what it was for a second I haven't thought about that show since it aired!
Man I really love your channel
Great video ! Charleroi even developed a kinf of urbex tourism focused on its brownfields and inudustrial past, nice way to shed light on its patrimony and not be ashamed of its past like it's too often the case ! Btw, the line ends with a tunnel leading to an underground station situated under the shopping centre "Cora". Cheers !
Greetings from Belgium and thanks for the very accurate explanation. Impressive !
You did not mention that the remainder of the money went to the mafia, but I suppose you can't tell without finding a horse head in your bed.
I just found out that he does all the music himself. If so, that’s really impressive. Great job man! It really adds a lot to the video!
The goosebumps theme added in was dope! Cool video
Well if you want to make a video where you have to explain a LOT of stuff that nobody gets, and the inhabitants are completely oblivious of it, you come to Belgium. Stay a while and look around for some ghost bridges, giant BOAT lifts, crazy lake-pumping powerplants and staggeringly random architecture. I always enjoy the outsider's view when they colourfully bring their wonder into words. Great video!
Yes, all of Belgium is full of things like this.
The explanation is very accurate. Perhaps interesting to mention: the investments also served the local economy (trams made by ACEC, steel supplied by the local steel industry), Charleroi had a well-known reputation as rail industry.
In addition, Charleroi had a particularly large neighborhood tram network that had to be modernized (lines to La Louviere, Binche, Theux, Thuin, ...). It is a pity that the resources have not been used to modernize the existing tram network, but to realize a new network with far too high costs and operation (also because of politics, there were 2 "companies" at that time, the STIC (Charleroi city operator) and SNCV (state wide operator) with different opinions and interests...).
and apparently from another comment, the trams of both those companies drove on the other side, so where they were supposed to move from one operator to the other, they made a crossover.
What Charleroi has ended up with is arguably pretty good for a city its size, a premetro that's underground in most of the city centre. There are much bigger cities in Europe with much worse mass transit infrastructure, they suffer more traffic congestion as a result. It's possible the tram system would have been too slow and congested to serve the growing suburbs adequately, many old tram systems in Europe were upgraded to premetro (or even full metro in some cases) for reasons like that. Would have been ideal to have both, but they only had the funds to do one.
I can tell you that the renovation of all the trains and all of the signaling of all the tracks are going to start at the end of this year, how do I know that you ask ? Well, some of my collegues are working on precisely that, I work in the company that is contracted to do all of the renovation
Wow! an amazing video, my grand parents were from the outskirts of Charleroi, I lived there in the late 80's.
I wonder whatever happened to those fully automated, underground parkings that the gouverner, at that time, had "built".
Nice video! Your understanding is very good! We can tell your research are very good.
At 8:37 it is a nice touch of you to play the music of the city "Pays de Charleroi"!
I'm wondering how did you find that song!
My maternal grandparents have been living not too far from one of those lines. When I was a kid my grandfather would regularily bring me along to explore the line. It was really creepy for me back then, and now seeing those images does bring back strong nostalgia. Cannot do that anymore today as it's one of the lines that has been opened since.
Also feels weird to see images of places I'm familiar with, here on youtube, especially that retail park, that takes me waaay back...
For those curious, at about 2:25 he says "is that an allotment?", I looked it up and it is a British term for a kind of community garden.
Fwiw, it's also a reference to [the last 2 minutes of] this series by Geoff Marshall: czcams.com/video/DrdQ0cGfri0/video.html
I am originally from Charleroi further area and I was not aware of this ^^ Thanks for explaining.
Great video. Thanks, I had no idea that Charleroi had a metro system...
Belgian viewer here, you nailed it !
As someone who worked for a Flanders based organisation until fairly recently, a very accurate description of the madness of Belgian politics!
My new favorite channel on CZcams!
I remember going to Charleroi on my own when I was 17, I'm from Brussels. I couldn't find my way and someone told me "you need to take the metro and blablabla" so I spent 10 minutes looking for a metro entrance. You know, underground. Like, a metro. I didn't find it so I asked someone else who pointed to the tramway, and I was like "it's a tram" and he was like "it's the metro". I took it, and I still think it's a tramway or a "pre-metro" like in Brussels.
If you like trains and tracks, you should visit the train museum in Treignes. In the summer time, the decommissioned train track are opened to run historical trains, it's called "le train des 3 vallées". I believe you can take the train to Mariembourg and catch the Historical train there. When the trains are not running, you can easily walk along the tracks and around the stations. The Treignes station is not a station anymore, it used to be a lodging and lab for scientific "expeditions" in the area. I believe it was sold a few years ago, I don't know what became of it. It's fun and family friendly :)
Now I'm looking forward to your video on the 2026 opening of Charleroi new metro line (which probably won't happen until 2030 at the earliest).
Lovely video, we're just getting our train line installed and running in Ottawa so it fun to see other places also waffling about :D
You should do a video on the abandoned tram tunnels of Ludwigshafen. In the 1970s it was planned to have 5 proper (standard gauge as opposed to the piddly 1m gauge they started with) light rail lines crossing between Ludwigshafen on the left bank of the Rhine and Mannheim on the right. Sadly the money ran out and only one line was built but this was run as only part of the Ludwigshafen side and the rest of the network including the planned tunnel under the Rhine was never even started.
Trams ran on this line between Oppau in the north and Rheingönnheim in the south until December 2008 when it was closed for lack of passengers, but the tunnels are still there with the track in place as if they were just waiting for the day when they can get to live again and welcome the steel wheels of trams once more..
Now that's really interesting! btw love when the Geography now music starts playing