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Near the Brussels-South station, one of the main access points to the center of the Belgian capital, Brussels offers the vision of a totally disaster zone, hampered by barriers and fences. In question, the construction site of the extension of the metro network providing for the creation of a “line 3” (in addition to the existing four), to connect the south and the north-east of the city, up to the airport from Zaventem. It was due to end this year: at best it will be in 2031. And above all, it is at a standstill.
The work required the digging of a 120 meter tunnel under the Palais du Midi, an imposing historic building from the 19th century.e century, classified site which brings together sports clubs and around forty shops. But the nature of the ground under the building makes it difficult to develop: it corresponds to the old bed of the Senne, the main watercourse which crosses the city and which was vaulted at the end of the 19th century.e century.
Faced with a waterproofing problem, the site had to be stopped a year and a half ago, when it was noted that the concrete poured into the pillars before digging was leaking into the old bed. The Royal Commission on Monuments and Sites had warned, as early as 2016, that the site represented a threat to the building, four years after expertise supported by engineers from the Société des transports intercommunaux de Bruxelles (STIB), the operator main public transport, had validated the launch of the works.
Nuisances for a few years
In 2017, another expert, Bruno Clerbaux, also expressed reservations in an environmental impact report. In March 2024, he told the show “ Investigations » from the Belgian channel RTBFas well as in the magazine Medor, In an investigation entitled “A metro named drifts”that “anyone with knowledge of geotechnical matters could perfectly predict that we were going to have enormous problems, particularly with concrete injection.”
Whatever. STIB has another solution, which involves the destruction and reconstruction of the palace, with an additional cost estimated at 433 million euros. “A fantastic opportunity for the renovation of the site”, believes Brieuc de Meeûs, his boss, who refutes any idea of error or improvisation in this matter. It always estimates line 3 ” absolutely necessary “, while declaring that he does not know when the file will be definitively closed: “2035 or 2045…”, he said, without being ironic, in front of the RTBF cameras on March 27.
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