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The birth of the Belgian railways With the introduction of the steam engine at the beginning of the 19th century, the railways became a symbol of the industrial revolution. While trains may have been invented in Great Britain, they were used for the first time on mainland Europe in Belgium.
When it gained independence from the Netherlands in 1830, Belgium risked losing its role as a transit country. The waterways to the northern provinces were closed and the port of Antwerp was blocked. It quickly became clear that Belgium needed a new link between Antwerp and the Rhine which did not pass through the Netherlands. It was therefore necessary to pass through Germany and, to achieve this, a canal or railway line would have to be built. The second option was chosen.
 Following many parliamentary debates, the law relating to the creation of a national railway network was ratified on 1st May 1834. The plan certainly didn’t suffer from a lack of ambition: the state decided to develop a network covering approx. 380 kilometres.
On 5th May 1835, the railway line linking Brussels and Malines was opened. A modern and extensive railway infrastructure was quickly installed in Belgium. By 1843, the central axes comprising North-South and East-West sections were completed. In around 1850, the Belgian railway network covered some 1000 km of track and 30 years later this figure had already quadrupled. Belgian industries quickly began to produce rails and rolling stock, in particular Cockerill.
Thanks to the discovery of new techniques and materials, the comfort and security of the lines was improved. Belgian engineers constructed some spectacular pieces of engineering including the famous incline idea by Henri Maus for Ans to overcome irregularities in the landscape.
In the 20th century, the talent and skills of the railwaymen enabled the fast reconstruction of the infrastructure destroyed during the two world wars. From 1935, the SNCB underwent a real technical revolution with the electrification of the network. However, the fast increase in road traffic during the 60s threatened the profitability of many local lines. During this period, the SNCB closed a number of these lines and pursued a strategy of modernisation and electrification on the main lines.
Today, the Belgian railway network covers 3,536 kilometres of track: 2,950 of these are electrified and, of these, more than 300 are able to take high speed trains. Our railway network is one of the densest and most modern in Europe.
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