19 Jan 2010

MY WORLD - Brussels Main Station


more participants here

If ever one day you arrive by train in Brussels you will arrive at the main station where I take you today.

Bruxelles-Midi (Brussels South) is the major railway station in Brussels. The station is bilingual French-Flemish (dutch), or at least should be, but if you take a closer look most of the informations are written in English that way it wouldn't offend neither the French nor the Flemish speaking people in Brussels. With both languages, there would be no room enough on the signs.

The railway station opened in 1869. In 1949 the station was demolished and replaced by the current yellow building with the clock tower.



An old picture. The South station outside, has the still the same look today .

In the 1990s the terminals of the high speed train Eurostar which runs through the chanel tunnel and connects France to the UK and the Thalys which runs to Paris, were added.


you can biggyfy all pictures

the huge hall



At the entrance of the Eurostar, there is this typical English telphone booth



time tables



and seats in front of "Air France"



A car rental office and not a red zone spot !



Snacks, cafés and restaurants



Boutiques and shops



of course the Belgian chocolate



the way through a shopping gallery







Not much work anymore mostly to exchange $ and £. Nearly all European countries have now the Euro currency.



A design of Hergé the "father" of Tintin and Snowy



and his signature

12 comments:

  1. The outside looks like it's a real industrial area but the inside is beautiful. Not having train stations over here in Hawai'i it's wonderful to see things like this :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. Looks great to me, Gattina! Wish I had the opportunity to visit! Great photos! And, yes, it is wonderful to get to visit -- at least this way!! Have a great week!

    Sylvia

    ReplyDelete
  3. The Eurostar stops here? Looks like Waterloo Station in London, but they don't have as many shops. Great photos.

    ReplyDelete
  4. That is some railway station. So big and modern. I wish someone from the transport department from here would visit and come back and improve ours.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Wow - the train station is HUGE! What's inside the old English phone booth?

    ReplyDelete
  6. What a great tour Gattina! Just send the chocolates my way OK?

    ReplyDelete
  7. the inside of the rail station is great...the main station in rome is nothing as nice as this. as that is the only station i frequent yearly, it's the only comparison i can make ;0
    thanks for sharing this info...one day i may train to brussels from france...you never know.
    hugs

    ReplyDelete
  8. nothing like that here at all...
    I do wish the trains would be updated in the US

    ReplyDelete
  9. Thanks for the visit at the train station in Brussels! I really hope one day I will have the chance to visit it. Tintin is one of my prefered cartoons. I remember the good time I had when little girl I red all the albums. If all informations would be in english at french train stations I am sure people should learn this universal language. But now the tendance is to learn dialects we spoke here at the 19 th century still! Crazy!

    ReplyDelete
  10. Beautiful! I don't think you could FIND a phone booth in Union Station in D.C.! As a matter of fact - I remember the trouble I had finding a phone booth ANYWHERE when I asked for it on a scavenger hunt! IF we have any in the states anymore they need to make them BIG and RED like the English versions - or no one will ever find them! Every one I did find had been vandalized and was no longer a working telephone!

    ReplyDelete
  11. It looks really big and modern. So much bigger than our little Stockholm Central - the main station! *giggles*

    ReplyDelete

Dear Anonymous,
Please do not be shy and leave your name, otherwise you will end up in the bin !