Brussels’ underground river will partially resurface after 150 years in hiding

Like many European cities, Brussels has a river, but it has been buried since 1871 due to a lack of sewage, something the authorities are now seeking to reverse with a new project that aims to uncover part of the Seine.

The Belgian city, home to the Grand Place that amazed Victor Hugo, has a wide range of sights, from Gothic churches to its diverse urban murals to its beer alleys. However, unlike other European capitals, It lacks a visible river to cross or skirt.

It is easy to imagine Paris and the Seine, or Rome and the Tiber, or Madrid and Manzanares, but in the case of Brussels it only has a navigable canal, but it is artificial.

However, the city, and more specifically, the Secretary of State for the Brussels-Capital Region, responsible for urban planning and heritage, Ans Persons, has decided to launch a project to begin the restoration of the Seine.

“They closed it at the end of the 19th century for sanitary reasons, but before that there was water all over the city centre and they covered everything. Today we regret it because in the city it is nice to walk on the river, and even though we have a canal, it is not the same,” Perssons told EFE.

The river was completely covered between 1867 and 1871 for reasons of hygiene and urban planning due to the overcrowding of Brussels.The seine was seen as the cause of all evil, particularly contributing to the spread of cholera.

Thanks to the work of the treatment plants and the various treatments the river has received, it now has the right conditions to see the sky again, or rather the clouds, as it passes through Brussels.

“It was open sewers back then, where diseases spread, but now we have sewers, we control the water quality and we have all the necessary medicines to prevent the spread of diseases. It was a completely different time, and it will no longer create any health problems.”

He also explains that the works will be carried out in the north of the city, a few metres from the noisy Brussels North station, since urban conditions allow it, unlike areas such as the centre of Brussels, where the numerous buildings make it impossible to carry out any action of this kind.

In the selected area, surrounded by houses and offices of relatively recent construction, you can see the different green spaces that intermittently cross the neighborhood from north to south and which, according to Pearsons, will unite after the project with the river as a spine element.

Work will begin in the first half of next year with the aim of bringing the Seine to light 650 metres along its course, with a width ranging from 4 to 16 metres, depending on the water level.

These measures, which are “expensive”, said Pearsons without specifying the amount, will be part of a larger project with a budget of 40 million euros aimed at redeveloping the area.

“It is now a commercial area, but we want to build more houses because it is one of the neighborhoods that will transform dramatically in the next ten years,” highlights the political leader.

They will also plant more than 550 trees in the new park and more than 20,000 square metres will be converted into green spaces.

The work will take a few years, says Pearsons, given the scale and nature of the project, but Brussels will wait patiently, as it has done for the 150 years its river has been buried.