In 2023, train punctuality in Belgium hit a five-year low, according to official statistics published on Friday by Infrabel, the rail infrastructure manager, on its Open Data web portal.
Over 46,000 trains were also cancelled in 2023, setting a record.
For the entire year of 2023, the punctuality rate stood at 87.5%, down from 89.2% in the previous year. This implies that over one in ten trains ran at least six minutes late.
Interestingly, the overall punctuality rate doesn’t account for cancelled trains. Last year, a monumental 46,086 train trips were cancelled. If these cancellations are considered, the punctuality drops further to 84.6%, compared to 86.4% in 2022. In concrete terms, this means that roughly one out of every seven trains was at least six minutes late or cancelled last year.
According to the Open Data site, 39.9% of the delays were attributed to third parties, 39.1% to the SNCB, 17.3% to Infrabel, and 3.5% to other operators. Incidents impacting punctuality included person strikes, trespassing on tracks, and rolling stock failures. A bomb alarm at Antwerp central station last October also caused 2,833 minutes of delay and led to the cancellation of 226 trains.
Both the network manager, Infrabel, and the railway company deemed train punctuality unsatisfactory. “This is not what passengers deserve,” they commented. “Improving punctuality will be the main priority for the SNCB and Infrabel in 2024.”
