Abstract: To leave, to stay or both? The impact of the Belgian transport policy on the labor mobility of the rural households during the nineteenth century This article focuses on the Belgian railway network to scrutinize the growth in labor mobility during the nineteenth century. It seeks to understand how the connectivity of the transport network influenced the labor markets of the rural economy, specifically regarding the textile crisis of the 1840s and the agrarian crisis of the 1880s. The research is based on national statistics and contemporary sociological studies. It is argued that the possibility to grow your own food was a key variable in the location choices of rural households as well as in the employment strategies of the industrial elite. This severely restricted rural outmigration. Finally, the article tests the validity of this argument by visualizing both the Belgian urbanization process and the railway network.