Customers flocked to the main shopping streets in the Belgian capital at the start of the first weekend following the reopening of so-called “non-essential” stores.
Due to the crowd, access to Rue Neuve had to be limited throughout Saturday. A similar measure had to be taken at the Chaussée d'Ixelles for part of the day. However, no incidents were registered.
On Friday, the City of Brussels launched a website on which the density of the crowd on Rue Neuve could be seen live. It had reached code-red levels by 11 a.m. on Saturday, and remained that way for the rest of the day.
The crowd was “not as dense as during yearend shopping in previous years, but given the Corona measures, you could still say it was very dense,” Brussels Police Spokesman Olivier Slosse said. “The Rue Neuve’s maximum capacity of 3,000 persons was reached throughout the day.”
The Brussels Times
