Eurostar trains to Amsterdam and Rotterdam to be suspended for up to 11 months

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• BA Flyer IHG Stayer says:

  4 Jun4 June 18:25

  “Fault of the Dutch”

  What a strange thing to say! They want / need to do lots of improvement works in and around Centraal and I really don’t think that their priority is – no matter how desirous – maintaining 4 trains a day for a max of 1,000 departing passengers a day when they have tens and tens and tens of thousands of non Eurostar passengers to maintain services.for!

• Bobajob says:

  4 Jun4 June 18:39

  This will be a pain for me. As a result of Brexit my company has moved it’s EU headquarters from London to Amsterdam so, on my frequent trips to Amsterdam, I’ve taken to using the Eurostar. The 18:04 departure allows me a full day in the office in Holborn, 2 stops on the Piccadilly line to STP and then I can work/relax for 4 hours un-interrupted and be in my hotel about 10 mins after arriving in Amsterdam Centraal thanks to the domestic style arrival and 3 stops on the tram. Other work colleagues usually use the flight from LCY and it is (marginally) quicker – but not so easy to work if necessary. Also, the last time I did this, the 1 hour queue through immigration in Schipol was not fun at all. Also, on the return, the 18:47 departure from Centraal means I can easily work fairly late in the Amsterdam office and get a tram back to Centraal station without the lottery that is Schipol. I agree with others have noted that the stop in Brussels and Lille could be shorter to bring the travel time to below 4 hours though. If the ultimate plan is to get the Eurostar to Amsterdam Zuid, this wouldn’t be good for me either….however, I should be retired by 2036!

  • ADS says:

    4 Jun4 June 20:28

    will you consider using Eurostar between London and Brussels and taking Thalys between Brussels and Amsterdam ?

    I think some of the connection times are fairly similar to the direct service

    • Bobajob says:

      4 Jun4 June 23:10

      Probably not if I’m honest. The hassle of having to make a connection would make it non-viable for me and I would probably revert to LCY flights with my colleagues. The return connection would, presumably, be extended if I had to get to Brussels in time to go through check-in there rather than at Amsterdam. The ease of the through service is the major selling point for me.

• Nick says:

  4 Jun4 June 22:14

  Can’t they revert back to the old system of running as a ‘domestic’ train from Amsterdam to Brussels and doing security and passports at Brussels?

• vlcnc says:

  5 Jun5 June 09:55

  Genuinely furious at this. We use this a lot, my best friend lives in Amsterdam and it is how we visit him and his family. 11 months is ridiculous, and no wonder Eurostar is furious! My general feeling is the Dutch don’t seem that keen on having this service, evidenced even by the poor signage for the platform where it leaves at Amsterdam Centraal.

• BahrainLad says:

  5 Jun5 June 11:16

  Always amusing to hear from the NTDWB (“nothing to do with Brexit”) / WWNIS (“we were never in Schengen!”) crowd desperate to muddy the waters as to whether their pet project is responsible for all this hassle (narrator: it is.). Prior to Brexit the majority of Eurostar passengers were EU citizens and required very minimal checks. Post Brexit a far greater proportion are non EU citizens (perhaps even a majority now) and require full checking (entry/exit stamps, overstay, means of support etc.). Hence all the delays.

  • vlcnc says:

    5 Jun5 June 11:44

    I am not a brexiteer and generally avoided the pointless debate on previous page, but functionally the need for juxtaposed controls hasn’t changed. This would still be a required if we were in the EU. It’s been an uphill battle for Eurostar to service the Netherlands, and it has been the Dutch that have been the stumbling block. They’re really not keen on supporting it for whatever reason, even though as a country are limiting flights especially at their main hub in Schiphol. You would think they’d want alternative modes, especially for a connection that is so short by distance. I suspect this is ultimately down to money and how much the government owned NS get out of the pie, even though they currently provide staff between Brussels and Amsterdam .

• John A says:

  5 Jun5 June 15:26

  As both Eurostar and Thalys are now the same firm will through fares , through booking be available for the same fare as London – Rotterdam / Amsterdam direct ?

  • Rob says:

    5 Jun5 June 16:44

    Yes I assume so, given that you can already book these combos on the Eurostar site alongside the direct trains.

    • FrenchInLondon says:

      5 Jun5 June 18:51

      The next stage of integration has been announced as October/November this year, so no reason why not… By the way Rob, any news / gossips on what’s likely to happen to the Eurostar Frequent Traveller programme?

      • Rob says:

        5 Jun5 June 18:56

        It’s going to be merged into a combined Thalys / Eurostar scheme but I don’t know any more.

• David Hawkins says:

  6 Jun6 June 11:30

  The problem is the inflexibility of the British Border Force who refuse to carry out passport checks on a moving train (even the Soviet Union managed that). Border Force insist on airport style security and that explains why you can only travel by Eurostar from St Pancras.
  Midnight Trains were planning a luxury sleeper service from Edinburgh to Paris but that has been indefinitely postponed because of Border Force. Unless you actually want to go from London to Paris or Brussels the train just isn’t practical.
  There is no guaranteed connection from Eurostar to the Sleeper train to Berlin so if your Eurostar train is delayed or cancelled forget it!
  I will happily choose the train over the plane for environmental reasons when there is actually a SERVICE from London to Berlin not two incompatible train routes botched together.
  Sleeper Trains to go through the Channel Tunnel were constructed at our expense and then flogged off to the Canadians.

• peter says:

  8 Jun8 June 05:41

  I live in Australia but am in AMS and UK every year. I always thought I might try the train someday. Lets put it off another 10 years, sounds like a debacle

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