The new “bridge station” in Mons will be put into service this Wednesday morning with the passage of a first train at 4:30 a.m. This first day marks the end of an imposing project which was ten years late. Its budget also exploded, going from 37 to 480 million euros.
The new station has five covered platforms, including one dedicated to buses, taxis and drop-offs, and another for mixed buses and trains. It will gradually house fourteen businesses, as well as services such as luggage storage, a TEC counter from January, a money distributor and a medical sampling center for the Mons CHR branch.
The new station is also equipped with two car parks with 862 spaces for cars and 350 for bicycles. The city side car park will be put into service at a later date.
Commuters and people passing through can reach the historic center on foot from the Grands-Prés district and vice-versa, thanks to a new covered footbridge measuring 165 by 15 meters between Place Léopold and Place des Congrès. However, this will not be the case for bicycles, which are prohibited on the platform.
Mixed feelings
The first commuters met this Wednesday morning were mixed about this new station and one word kept coming back: finally. “Finally, after so many years of construction, we were starting to lose hope. It’s super beautiful, but it’s still a lot of money for so little when we have a lot of things in the surrounding area that could use a renovation. Finally we will be able to be warm after so many years“, note Loyd.
Ewan is totally convinced by the architecture of the building. “I find it super beautiful“, he enthuses before highlighting a point of concern: the interview. “If it’s like Liège station, maintenance could be expensive“.
Another young commuter, Loïs, took the train early to admire the new station and does not regret it. “I like it, it’s bright, quite big, I think it was well done. I’m not disappointed“, he expresses.
The station will be officially inaugurated on January 31, 2025. Mons, the fifth station in Wallonia in terms of attendance, welcomes some 57,000 travelers per week. It is served by 189 trains every weekday.
Mons station commissioning of construction site Mons station
