Atelier de traction de Kinkempois
Atelier de traction de Kinkempois is a large, old railway site in Belgium. It has 38 train tracks and many railway buildings. This place was used for shunting, repairs, and train storage. In 2018, a new workshop opened. After that, the old buildings were no longer used.
The first building here was a passenger train station. It opened in 1883. In 1959, the old station was demolished and replaced with a new one. Trains stopped coming in 1984. The new station was then demolished in 2009.
In 1939, a big workshop was built on the site. A long building stands in the middle of the train yard. The ground floor was for shunting staff. The first and second floors were used for the ATF railway museum. This museum closed in 2017.
Poste R and S
At one end of the service building is signal box ‘Poste R’. Another building, called ‘Poste S’, closed in April 2018. For many years, this box was always occupied, day and night. It had a special mechanical control system. The dark green Siemens panel and hand-painted Optical Control Board (OKB) still remain. Staff operated signals and switches with levers and wires.
In front of Poste S is the last active turntable in Belgium. It is 24 meters long. Trains were turned around here until the very end. A 2017 railway journal still shows proof of its use.
New workshop
In April 2018, the SNCB opened a new 17,000 square meter workshop on the east side of the Kinkempois yard. This modern building can service whole trains quickly. It also works on electric and diesel locomotives for SNCB, Infrabel, and other companies.
Today, the old workshop and buildings are abandoned. The site of the former workshop—nearly 10 hectares—is in fact now for sale, and its fate seems uncertain. Nature is slowly taking over. It is a quiet place full of history and rusting steel, a perfect spot for urban explorers. I visited the site in 2023.
