My little daily trip while working in the Brussels metro. Feces, leftover drugs. It’s a beautiful city

36 comments

  6. Rogier elevator?

    That area is heavily trafficked – not only do you have all the Rue Neuve tourists, but equally the commuters working in the area, as well as the ongoing homeless issue.

    I work in the immediate area and I can confirm the elevator needs some love, but it doesn’t look like this every day.

    Station maintenance is outsourced at Rogier (the whole STIB, I think?) so unfortunately this is a reflection of what the STIB is paying for – or, alternately, what they have the data for.

    Regardless of where the elevator is, you can always signal hygiene issues to the STIB station manager, either in person or social media, or using the FixMyStreet app, which has quite a quick turnaround time.

    At Rogier, the station desk is about 25 metres behind the elevator and opens at 6:30 AM.

    Thanks for your interest in keeping the city clean!

  12. When I think of Brussels I think of the smell of stale urine. And you can all say “muh any big city in the world” but actually that’s not true.

  13. So I was addicted to heroin for a bit and know very well the Ribeaucourt area, this city needs to adress the issue its out of control lmao. Its actually what made me relapse, I moved near Simonis and kept seeing heroin leftover and people smoking it, sometimes the lingering smell, fuck that.

    There needs to be places dedicated to using and actual care, most of these people are homeless and/or mentally ill. And heroin is tricky to smoke, so if its just a little windy they’ll go inside the metro stations. And being dope sick is not a fucking joke, I’m not homeless and a little ashamed of this but I had to resort using the metro too because I was violently sick and ready to shit myself/throw up in public.

  16. Same in every big city. Never go to San Francisco, as this is everywhere in the streets.

  17. I’ve been to quite some druggy cities (NY, LA, New Orleans, the whole US South…) but Brussels is the only one where I saw people shooting up in public. Metro station Yser, btw, right at the entrance.

  20. I do admit I have seen more and more public drug use and high people over the past year in Brussels.

    But what I saw in LA and SF a few years back was on a wholllleeee other level though.

  24. Isn’t a simple solution to just add more public toilets?

    It seems like we’re trying to solve this the complicated way… just put a toilet nearby. problem solved.

  28. Last time I was in Brussels I walked past one of those public urinals with a raster at the bottom, and there was a whole human shit on it. Lovely!

  29. It’s the same issue with the homeless people. It’s impossible to stay sober if you’re out on the street and don’t have anything to eat especially in this freezing temperature. The smell of piss and poop everywhere, drug leftover etc. are the symptoms of a bigger problem that is Belgium is doing nothing for the homeless people.

  31. I usually take the metro at Simonis, which is pretty chill. Go to Ribaucourt once, some next level shit.

    Drug problem was way worse when I lived in Paris 18 though.

  33. Is the unopened can of any significance?

    I once found an unopened can of Jupiler next to a big pile of poop + puddle of pee next to the apartment building elevator and was wondering whether it was deliberate or just too fucked up to care.

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