Noorderkempen railway station

Noorderkempen
Noorderkempen
Railway Station
General information
Location	Brecht, Antwerp, Belgium
Coordinates	51°21′25″N 4°37′58″E / 51.35694°N 4.63278°E
Owned by	National Railway Company of Belgium
Line(s)	HSL 4
Platforms	2
Tracks	4
History
Opened	15 June 2009
Services

Noorderkempen is a railway station near the town of Brecht, Antwerp province, Belgium. The station opened on 15 June 2009 on the HSL 4 high speed line between the Netherlands and Belgium. The train services are operated by National Railway Company of Belgium (NMBS) and Nederlandse Spoorwegen (NS).

The station makes the Northern Kempen region connected to the rail network via the HSL 4 route and is the only true high-speed station in Belgium. However, it is not served by any true high-speed train, functioning rather as a park and ride for Antwerp and to a lesser extent Breda. The Thalys services (300 km/h) skip the station as the IC services (160 km/h - 200 km/h) serve the station.

This station features four tracks: the outside ones, with side platforms, are used by trains stopping there, while the central ones, with no platforms, are used by nonstop high-speed trains.

History

The station was due to open in September 2007 but this and several other deadlines were not met. The main reason given for this was the ETCS signalling not being approved for use. The station was opened in 2009 and is served by shuttle services between the station and Antwerp.

International services to the Netherlands have started calling at this station in April 2018. Services are timetabled to depart at the same time in each direction (1 minute past the hour), to facilitate bus connections.