In 2023 Dutch railway operator Nederlandse Spoorwegen (NS) will introduce a new train service branded as Airport Sprinter. It will provide a fast connection between Amsterdam Centraal station and Schiphol Airport every 7-8 minutes. Also, the company will speed up its train links between southern and northern parts of the Netherlands.

The Airport Sprinter service will be provided by Sprinter New Generation trains produced by CAF. They will run on the route between Amsterdam Centraal and Hoofddorp via Schiphol Airport. Currently, there are only two Sprinter train connections per hour on this route with stops at Amsterdam Sloterdijk and Amsterdam Lelylaan. They run with the 30-minute intervals.

Within an hour, the passengers are also able to use two Sprinter trains heading to Den Haag Centraal (The Hague Centraal) and five Intercity trains to Breda, Rotterdam or Brussels. Moreover, there are two Intercity trains per hour going to Enkhuizen via Amsterdam Sloterdijk station located in the northwestern part of the city.

From Rotterdam to Groningen

NS also intends to accelerate its train services between southern and northern parts of the country by 2023. Initially, the travel time from Rotterdam to Zwolle, Assen, Groningen and Leeuwarden will be reduced by 4 minutes and from Breda to Nijmegen, Arnhem and Zwolle by half an hour. “It is a first important step to shorten travel time between the Randstad and the northern Netherlands with a fast train,” said Roger van Boxtel, CEO of NS. Afterwards, the Dutch railway operator intends to continue this policy.

This will be done with the help of InterCity Next Generation (ICNG) trains ordered from Alstom. The first vehicles of this type will be supplied to the Netherlands in January 2020. However, they will start to provide regular northbound or southbound connections in 2021. The exact schedule of ICNG trains will be announced in 2022.