Still can't believe how much of a slog it is to leave Brussels by the train to North or East. 10 min to do the 5 km nonstop to Schaerbeek, then acceleration to 200 km/h but slow down to 110 to cross Leuven station.
On the approach to Aachen, had to wait 5 min for the opposite direction ICE to pass us. There's only one track at Aachen Hbf for both directions for the high speed trains.
@DiegoBeghin there's not. There are at least 2, possibly even 3. Why they don't make use of it, 🤷♂️ Although the voltage change is complex. And Leuven is 160km/h I think, not 110.
@DiegoBeghin I’ve sped through there. But also sometimes crawled I admit. But seriously how could you have built this out of Brussels any other way? Bear in mind a good 80% of people profiting from that infra are doing Liege - Leuven, Leuven - Bruxelles or Liege - Bruxelles. Comparatively few going internationally.
@jon Zaventem is the point of closest approach to the E40, build a 4 km tunnel and you can get a 300 km/h alignment much earlier.
And I assume you're the first to know that the reason not as many people travel internationally is that the service/infrastructure is bad. There are many bigger cities than Liège beyond the border. On the other side Paris is of course massive.
@jon There's no threshold effect, faster service will always be more attractive.
In any case, new tracks are a great way to improve reliability. I don't think the current Aachen-Köln situation with ICEs, regional trains and even freight trains sharing the same 2 tracks is good for the timetable. And if you're building new tracks, make them fast!
@DiegoBeghin Except you can't easily mix them. And you have finite resources. Belgium 20 years ago committed to 200km/h Schaerbeek - Leuven, 160km/h through Leuven, 300km/h to Ans, and 250km/h Liege to the border, which is fine. The Aachen part needs serious work, and replacing DB ICE 406 series with something better is urgently overdue. But that Belgian infra is OK.
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