History

The Hague's oldest station is Den Haag Hollands Spoor (HS). This station is located between Amsterdam and Rotterdam, and was opened in 1843. Hollands Spoor was just outside the town centre. A second station opened in 1870 (Den Haag Rijnspoor, later named Den Haag Staatsspoor) for passengers travelling in the direction of Gouda and Utrecht. This station was on the other side of the city. Both stations were conceded to Staatsspoorwegen, a private railway company that later changed its name to Nederlandse Spoorwegen (NS), Netherlands Railways – in 1890.

When NS wanted to build a central station for The Hague in the 1960s, the most obvious place to do so in terms of railway operations was Den Haag HS. After all, this is where trains ran through from Amsterdam to Rotterdam. The municipality of The Hague objected, because they preferred having a station closer to the city centre. Moreover, the concentration of buildings around Den Haag Hollands Spoor station left little space for a large-scale extension of the tracks, platforms and buildings sideways.

A new central station was therefore constructed at the site of Den Haag Staatsspoor station . The first section of the new station was put into use on 27 September 1973. Additional link curves were laid to make train traffic from all directions possible. These curves and the greater number of platforms means that trains coming from Leiden, Rotterdam Centraal and Rotterdam Hofplein could terminate at Den Haag Centraal. The link curve to Laan van NOI station meant that from 1977, Den Haag Centraal station could also become a departure station for sprinter trains to Zoetermeer via the Zoetermeer line, which was put into full use in 1979. In 1981, trains via Leiden to the Schiphol line (which was opened that same year) also started running over this curve.

The bus platform was put into operation in 1975. The new The Hague Central Station was completed in 1976 with the delivery of the tram station, with the station being officially opened on 28 May of that year.