National Railway Company of Belgium

NMBS-Groep/Groupe SNCB
Government-owned corporation
Industry Rail Transport
Founded 1926
Headquarters Avenue de la Porte de Hal/Hallepoortlaan 40, 1060 Brussels, Belgium
Products Rail Transport
Revenue Increase € 2.296.6 billion (2012)
Increase € 6.306,5 million (2012)
Decrease € -152.3 million (2012)
Number of employees
 18688 (2005)
Subsidiaries NMBS/SNCB Logistics
Publifer
Syntigo
and more
Website www.belgianrail.be www.b-europe.com

SNCB/NMBS (Dutch: Nationale Maatschappij der Belgische Spoorwegen,[1] French: Société nationale des chemins de fer belges, German: Nationale Gesellschaft der Belgischen Eisenbahnen) is the national railway company of Belgium. The company formally styles itself using the Dutch and French abbreviations NMBS/SNCB,[2] however it is commonly referred to in English[3][4] and internationally[5][6][7][8] using just the French abbreviation SNCB. The corporate logo designed in 1936 by Henry van de Velde consists of the linguistically neutral letter B in a horizontal oval.

History

NMBS/SNCB is an autonomous government company, formed in 1926 as successor to the Belgian State Railways. In 2005, the company was split up into three parts: Infrabel, which manages the railway infrastructure, network operations and network access, the public railway operator NMBS/SNCB itself to manage the freight (B-Cargo) and passenger services, and NMBS/SNCB-Holding, which owns both public companies and supervises the collaboration between them. Essentially, this was a move to facilitate future liberalisation of railway freight and passenger services in agreement with European regulations. Several freight operators have since received access permissions for the Belgian network. In February 2011, NMBS/SNCB Logistics began operating as a separate business.[9]

Faced with rising losses, in June 2012, the Belgian transport minister announced further reform: NMBS/SNCB Holding would be split up, so NMBS/SNCB (the train operator) would be separate from Infrabel (the infrastructure owner). Unions oppose the reform.[10]

Operations

Route map

In 2008 NMBS/SNCB carried 207 million passengers[11] a total of 8,676 million passenger-kilometres over a network of 3,536 kilometres (of which 2,950 km are electrified, mainly at 3000 V DC and 351 km at 25 kV 50 Hz AC).

The network currently includes four high speed lines suitable for 300 km/h (190 mph) traffic: HSL 1 runs from just south of Brussels to the French border, where it continues to a triangular junction with LGV Nord for Paris Nord and Lille Flandres (and London beyond that), HSL 2 runs from Leuven to Ans and onward to Liège-Guillemins, HSL 3 runs from Liège to the German border near Aachen and HSL 4 connects with HSL-Zuid in the Netherlands to allow services to run from Antwerpen-Centraal to Rotterdam Centraal.

National enforcement body

Sometimes passengers are not satisfied with the answer of railway companies or passengers do not receive any answer in one month,[12] in which case they can seek the assistance of the Federal Public Service Mobility and Transport.[13]

See also

References

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