The Belgian City That Built A Metro Line... And Never Opened It

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.

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.

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!

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.

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.

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.

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 !

"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

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

As a Belgian, your view of Flanders and Wallonia as squabling siblings is pretty spot on I think.

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!

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, ..."

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.

You might want to the adress the 'Belgian City That Did Build A Metro Line' ran ancient trams through it for the best of twenty years and while they did build a tunnel crossing the river, and some nice stations, did practically no maintenance on the lines themselves. You can hear the walls crumbling as you ride through it. It's called Antwerp.

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.