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Yes of course. You can always isolate a door, notably in case it malfunctions. You have to be near the door to do it, which is why it gets never done. It would be too time consuming and the guard might not even be in the correct unit to do it. I'm sure that in older units it is not possible to...

With hauled stock, doors are opened and closed by the guard. I don't believe he has any way to control what doors open, other than left or right side. On MUs, the driver opens and the guard closes. May be he has a way to open them selectively, but I've never witnessed that. In case of short...

Only exception to that is (was ?) a 24 hours allowance for tourists coming on board cruise ships that dock in St Petersburg. Otherwise yes, only possible to enter with tourist visa and letter of invitation, or transit visa with very strict rules. Done that twice myself.

Indeed the Break units are not allowed in Aachen. And in a not too distant future, the voltage switch infrastructure in Aachen will be dismantled and replaced by a plain line junction somewhere near Hergenrath. At that moment, only multisystem locos will be able to cross the border. That will be...

Yes you are right. I have difficulties to qualify european citizens as "foreign" so was more thinking about people coming from overseas.

In Belgium, every citizen receives an identity card at age 12 and is required carry it each time he goes outside. Same for foreign nationals living in Belgium. This card has a pin code and a chip that can be used for online authentication. People not having such a card must have with them...

In Belgium, crossing loops are signalled in both directions. One of the tracks will be accessible with diverging switches at both ends (and thus require to slow down) and the other one will be straight (and so will allow full track speed). So if no crossing is expected, the straight track will...

Brussels Metro has some lines running on the right and some on the left. And then there is this infamous line on the Charleroi metro which switches from the right to the left somewhere in the middle...

Same for Belgium. Normal traffic is on the left but the whole network is equipped with bidirectional signaling (the wrong main signals are flashing), even the 4 tracks sections.

You will find 3-car PCCs on line 81, which goes through Brussels Midi station. And at the end of this line (station Montgomery) stands the terminus of lines 39 and 44 that are exclusively served by 2-cars PCC trams. Oldest belgian locos are HLE 21 and 27 series. They can still be seen about...

Yes. Also timed just after the Olympics. And during those works, the extra classical trains Brussels-Paris will not run, in order to leave enough capacity on line 96 for the diverted TGVs.

Two weeks every year for the next ten years. That's the Infrabel plan to entirely renew the tracks of this line, which is now more than 25 years old and supports some 300 trains per day. Some more details : This year will see works on the section between Silly and Antoing. 17 km of track will be...

Similarly, belgian high speed line n°1 will be closed for 2 weeks between 12 and 30 Aug. for track renewal. Same will take place for the next 10 years. Trains will be diverted via conventional lines.

All freight trains exiting Antwerpen Noord at Noorderdokken will also go through Berchem. But Berchem will let you see much more passenger trains. There are 3 exits from Antwerpen Noord : one at Noorderdokken on line 27A to the south and east, one at Ekeren on line 12 to the north and the...

Berchem (just south of Antwerpen Centraal) is probably your best bet.

That happened every day on the two TEE train pairs that did Brussels - Paris non stop in about 2h40.

Did you manage to see what power was hauling or pushing your M4 set ?

Thalys is for going to Paris. There are a few French TGV connections for southern France destinations.

I have been in Sri-Lanka for a 3 weeks vacation in 2019. I made 3 train trips, from Colombo to Anuradapura on the North line, from Peradenya to Nanu-Oya in tea country, and from Galle to Colombo. The trip in tea country was definitely the one I enjoyed the most. So I would vote for Kandy too...

I don't think so. You are not supposed to change trains if you have a direct connection. But you could probably play dumb and explain that you got a bit confused and got off the first train too early. As this is obviously not a fraud attempt, the traing guard would probably let it pass.