Where to live near Heerlen: four South Limburg neighbours compared

• Train · 12–16 minKerkrade Centrum to Heerlendirect · 2× per hour
• Bike · 36 minKerkrade Centrum to Heerlen9 km
• Car · 11 minKerkrade Centrum to Heerlen11 km

Kerkrade began as a hamlet around its church and then expanded with coal mining, so its housing is a patchwork of miners' colonies laid out after the First World War and later neighbourhoods such as Nulland and Rolduckerveld, which were built on the land freed when the Domaniale mine closed. The town has several district centres, among them Holz, Haanrade and Chevremont, rather than one dense core. Streets tend to feel quieter than in Heerlen, with fewer offices, shops and venues close at hand.

• Train · 15–20 minSittard to Heerlendirect · 4× per hour
• Bike · 72 minSittard to Heerlen17 km
• Car · 22 minSittard to Heerlen22 km

Sittard-Geleen is two towns with distinct textures. Sittard has a protected old centre and postwar neighbourhoods such as Baandert and Vrangendael, while Geleen grew around the Maurits state mine, with miners' housing in Lindenheuvel and a handful of older village cores. Many mining-era social housing blocks in Sittard have been replaced by newer neighbourhoods. After Heerlen's hillside districts and the apartments of the Maankwartier, the towns feel lower and more suburban, with schools, a hospital and valley parks inside the municipality.

• Metro, tram or bus · 19–43 minWilhelminastraat to Stationdirect · 6× per hour
• Bike · 31 minWilhelminastraat to Station7 km
• Car · 12 minWilhelminastraat to Station7 km

The core of Brunssum's identity is its protected mining-colony area: five miners' districts and two parks, many laid out on garden-city ideas in the years around the First World War, such as Rozengaard, Schuttersveld and Langeberg-Venweg. The town is split into many small neighbourhoods, with parks like the Schutterspark and Vijverpark, and it has no dense station quarter like Heerlen's Maankwartier. Streets tend to be low-key and residential, closer in feel to a village than to Heerlen's city centre.

• Train · 22–30 minMaastricht to Heerlendirect · 4× per hour
• Bike · 92 minMaastricht to Heerlen22 km
• Car · 24 minMaastricht to Heerlen24 km

Maastricht is the denser, older city: a conservation-area centre with one of the largest concentrations of national heritage buildings in the country, Wyck across the river, the Jekerkwartier next to the university and redeveloped industrial districts such as Céramique and Sphinx. Beyond them lie workers' neighbourhoods from the early twentieth century and more uniform postwar districts. Where Heerlen's housing is spread over hillside districts and a station quarter, Maastricht's tends to be compact, and students and international residents are a visible part of the rental scene.