Hotel Mercure Brussels Centre Midi

Hotel Mercure Brussels Centre Midi
Boulevard Jamar 25 29
1060
BRUSSELS
BELGIUM

Tel: (+32)2/5281890
Fax: (+32)2/5281891

The Mercure Brussels Centre Midi is a 4**** hotel and part of the Accor Hotels group, it is located about 450 metres from the Brussels Midi/Zuid station for the Eurostar services. There are metro and tram stops nearby but they are not wheelchair friendly. The hotel has a bar that opens Monday to Friday but not at weekends or Bank Holidays. It has a breakfast room but no restaurant though there are places to eat nearby.

Entering the hotel you pass through two automatic doors (like a revolving door without the revolving bit), these are quite tall and sitting in a wheelchair the sensors don’t always ‘see’ you. Check-in was done quickly and I was given two key cards for the room, one was for operating the door, the other was to leave in the slot inside the room entrance to keep the electricity on. There were two lifts which everyone used, stairs were there only for emergency evacuation. The card that was used to enter your room was also used to operate the lift.

The bed was a good size and comfortable, it was supplied with lots of pillows and cushions. There was room to manoeuvre a wheelchair all around it, but my (normal) size wheelchair only just fitted on the far side in the photograph. You could get in the space and reverse out again. There was a telephone beside the bed, a fridge, a large flat screen tv, and free Wi-Fi throughout the hotel. Above the fridge was tea and coffee making facilities and above that a safe to store your valuables but it was too high to reach from a wheelchair.

The wet room was adequate but not spacious. My wheelchair only just fitted through the door, if you have a large or an electric wheelchair you may want to check the door width with the hotel. The mirror was too high to be of use but there was a shaving mirror that could be moved to different angles, and a hairdryer.

To the wall side of the toilet was a fixed handrail and on the other side a drop down handrail. The other side of the wet room had a shower with a drop down seat. Like the toilet this was against the wall but the opposite side so you probably have to transfer from the other direction. The shower controls appeared to be in a suitable place to be able to use them, I didn’t try.

Whilst not being up to the standards of the hotels I used in Barcelona and Berlin this hotel is adequate and if I needed a hotel near to Brussels Eurostar station I would definitely stay again at the Hotel Mercure Brussels Centre Midi.

(I would like to thank Mikey, my monkey puppet, for his assistance with this blog.)