Members of the French-speaking green party Ecolo handed out chocolate to commuters in Wallonia and Brussels today to thank them for taking public transport. The action is part of the party's “Saint-Valentrain Day" celebrations.
Organised every year since the early 2000s, party members covered over a hundred municipalities on Tuesday, from Anderlecht to Charleroi, via Liège, Gembloux or Nivelles.
At Namur station, a dozen elected representatives responded to the party's call, chief among them was Georges Gilkinet, the Federal Mobility Minister for Mobility, who himself took the train to work.
The party stated that “rail is a transport of the future and deserves real support." It calls for "the train to become the preferred solution."
To achieve this, "it must be more attractive and less expensive than the private car" which is why "we need to invest massively in rail by promoting intermodality, the combination of train and bike or the integration of fares with other public transport.”
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Ecolo also explained that one of the party's objectives by 2040 is for a train to run every 30 minutes at each station in Belgium, and every 15 minutes near major cities.
Yet this should not be to the expense of smaller stops and the party recalled its support for the principle of maintaining all lines, even those least frequented, in order to make the train a real alternative for a large public.
