By Trevor Garrod

30 years ago I cycled from Amsterdam to Groningen, including taking my bicycle on the ferry across the Ijsselmeer from Enkhuizen to Urk. At that time Groningen, the largest city in the north of the Netherlands held the European record for the greater number of cycle journeys per head of population.

This year I made my second visit to Groningen – this time by train. When I arrived at passport control at Hoek van Holland, the official asked me where I was heading, and when I told her “Groningen” she said, “We don’t get many visitors going there.”

Perhaps that is one reason for visiting this region rather than tourist honeypots like Amsterdam.

Groningen and the two other provincial capitals of the north – Leeuwarden and Assen – have Inter City trains from Rotterdam and The Hague on a route that was electrified in 1952. The completion of the Hansa Line across the Flevoland polders has also brought them closer to Amsterdam.

I was now visiting the centre of Groningen as a pedestrian rather than a cyclist, which was something of an eye-opener. There seemed to be at least as many bicycles as in 1994, and there were also now buses run on batteries or hydrogen.

Groningen’s central station (which I hardly noticed 30 years ago) is a magnificent gothic- style edifice from the 1890s, while the main station at its smaller neighbour of Leeuwarden (which I also visited) is also a handsome building. In between the platforms at Groningen, builders are excavating to create an underpass which will be capped by a piazza, and hoardings tell you that they are “ making the Netherlands’ most beautiful station even more beautfiful.”

This northern region has seven local lines operated by Arriva diesel multiple units and I sampled four of these services. I dutifully entered all such journeys on my Interrail pass but not all the trains had a conductor and few stations had a ticket barrier.

One of these lines serving a string of villages and small towns and marshes north of the city was extended in the 1990s to Eemshaven, a modern port at the mouth of the River Ems. No one lives there, as far as I could tell, but a lot of people work there and freight trains run into the complex. Most passenger trains still terminate at Rodeschool, but I used one through to the post, which also has a ferry to German island of Borkum. It terminates at a simple platform opened in 2018 by King Willem Alexander himself, sheltered from the sea breezes by a grassy dike. There was a large car park visible from the station but only onwe other passenger boarded my train on this occasion.

In contrast, south east of Groningen, towards the German border, is a curious area of swamps and small lakes that used to be important for peat extraction but is now peppered by wind turbines and solar panels or, further on, arable and dairy farms on reclaimed land.

In 2013 a passenger service was introduced on the freight-only line as far as Veendam, a quiet neat town of some 25,000 which had lost its passenger trains as long ago as 1953. Close to its smart new platform is a large bus station, while the old rail station is used by a heritage line called STAR (www.stadskanaalrail.nl)

After coffee and apple cake in the station cafe, I exchanged my internet receipt (having booked my journey on line in the UK) for a classic Edmondson ticket for a return trip on Stadskanaal, (40 minutes each way) provided by a Deutsche Reichsbahn steam locomotive from 1942, four carriages and two wagons, one of which was for bicycles.

Stadskanaal is a linear settlement along a canal, built in typical Dutch fashion and its station is the headquarters of the heritage railway which has just one employee, the remainder of the staff being volunteers. I was able to speak with two of them who showed me their museum and said that Arriva had shown interest in extending its Groningen – Veendam trains to Stadskanaal and even beyond. It was considered that there was room for both operators.

As it is, STAR owns the track, but if its founder members had not acted swiftly in the 1990s (after the freight south of Veendam had ended), the tracks would have been lifted and a housing estate built there. In fact, my cycling holiday in 1994 had taken me along the low Hondsrug ridge south of Groningen and across to the German border, through Stadskanaal and I recall seeing rusty tracks largely covered in weeds and no sign of life. The resurrection of at least some of this line, and hopefully and part of the national network has been partly funded by the EU and other public bodies.

My visit to this fascinating and little known area continued by an Arriva train tp the border station of Bad Nieuwe Schans and then a local bus to Leer in Germany. Back in 2015 a cargo boat hit and destroyed the Friesenbrucke (Frisian Bridge) over the River Ems The regional press was now reporting on the progress in early August on the reconstruction work and plans to retore passenger services across the border by mid 2025. Indeed, the ultimate aim is to run a through service between Bremen, Oldenburg (whose station is being currently refurbished), Leer and Groningen

TG 07/08/2024

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