Brussel-Nationaal-Luchthaven

Nachdem ich nach meiner Ankunft in Brüssel aus zeitlichen Gründen ein Taxi hatte nehmen müssen, ging es auf dem Rückweg mit dem Zug zum Flughafen.
Die unterirdische Station Nationaal Luchthaven befindet sich direkt unter dem Flughafen. Es ist ein Tunnelbahnhof– und dementsprechend kann man hier in erster Linie ankommen und abfahren. Wobei man wirklich betonen kann und darf, dass etwa die Verbindungen von/​in Richtung Brüssel-​Innenstadt sehr gut sind. Zumindest tagsüber fahren– auch am Wochenende– locker vier bis sechs Züge pro Stunde diese Strecke. Und zwar nicht S-​Bahnen, sondern ICs. Wenn ich es richtig gesehen habe, gibt es hier wohl vier Gleise.
Verlässt man den Bahnsteig, findet man eine Ebene weiter oben Automaten vor. Und keine im übrigen sonderliche Infrastruktur.
Ein Bahnhof, der eigentlich nur zum Ankommen und Abfahren gedacht und geeignet ist– für das Verbringen von größeren Zeitfenstern ist er eher weniger geeignet. Aber bei den Takten hier sollte man sich hier auch nicht wirklich lange aufhalten müssen.

Yay, I’m a fan because the station is sooooo convenient. It runs under the airport and all you have to do when you arrive is go down a few floors, buy your ticket and get on the train to downtown Brussels, or in my case, all the way to Mons.
The one draw back is that there aren’t a lot of places to sit down when you’re there. You can wander down to your platform early though to find or seat and since it is at the airport several of the trains start their journeys from there, so are stationary for a while, so you can just hop on.

From the airport, the train station is located in –2 floor. You can buy your train tickets on –1 floor. =) Baggage claim area has ATMs to get Euros with your ATM card to prevent overswiping your debit card (coz we all know every swipe costs us a service charge).
This mode of transportation is a very convenient and safe means to travel in/​around/​out of Belgium. Antwerp was an hour train ride away to get to the City Centre. Great way to start the day with a Belgian waffle doused with some Belgian chocolates. Then, after walking around looking for the Manneken Pis — have a Belgian ale. Everything Belgian is oh so delish!

The station itself is clean, open, bright and easy to understand for the most part. I did see some Tourist having that «lost» expression on their faces at times but they seem to be that type anyways. As this station has many routes aside from Brussels and isn’t a dedicated line, it could bring about questions for foreign travellers but not many staff are available for assistance.
€ 8,50 to take the Airport Line towards BRUXELLES-​CENTRAL seems like a fair deal. That train itself however is neither luggage-​friendly nor stand-​up permitting. Narrow aisles along with little legroom means storing luggage needs more creativity than usual. Nothing indicated to me that this Airport Line Train was meant for that purpose, but it could be worst {looks at Toronto Airport’s lack of subway/​train}.
Every 15 minutes or so for the train seems to be a selling point as it was highlighted at the Arrival Hall exit way. Passing through Brussels-​Nord to Brussels-​Centrale, I saw signs of a worn-​down train route with unexpected amount of graffiti all along the route. Along with a gloomy weather forecast, it made me even more curious as to what I will discover in Bruxelles…
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A train station right at Brussels International Airport!
This is just amazing for visitors to Bruxelles like myself! From here, I can just hop on a train to Paris, Bruges and of course various stations in Bruxelles.
The train schedule to the City Centre itself is quite frequent.