Este artigo e o que
se segue, foram publicados em 2016.
Desde aí, as
medidas para desencorajar o turismo low cost / low flying só têm vindo a
acentuar-se.
Amsterdão quer
mudar de imagem e desencorajar um tipo de Turismo massificado, saturante e
desinteressante no plano humano e económico.
Em época de
Globalização Galopante e de Turismo Massificado cabe às cidades fazerem
escolhas estratégicas . Perante uma quantidade avassaladora e desinteressante,
é imperativo fazer uma escolha explícita pela Qualidade. E isso implica
Governação Estratégica.
OVOODOCORVO
Why are
Amsterdam's cannabis 'coffeeshops' closing?
“Within
five to ten years coffeeshops could be finished,” says Mr de Loor
Gavin
Haines, travel writer, amsterdam
5 DECEMBER
2016 • 9:55AM
I’m in
Mellow Yellow, Amsterdam’s oldest coffeeshop. Beneath a thin veil of smoke,
groups of men and women - young, old and of various nationalities - sit at
wooden tables, chatting, joking and sharing spliffs. Reggae flows from nearby
speakers, while a coffee machine noisily grinds beans behind the bar.
After
finding fertile ground in a decidedly grey area of Dutch drug law, Mellow
Yellow opened in 1967, blazing a trail for hundreds of other coffeeshops to
follow.
Next year
this historic establishment should be celebrating its 50th anniversary, but
instead it will be pulling down the shutters for the final time: by order of
the mayor, Mellow Yellow is to cease trading on January 1, 2017. This joint is
going out.
“Mellow Yellow was the first coffeeshop in the
world and now they want to close it,” says owner, Johnny Petram.
“I serve
thousands of people every day; tourists and locals. I have Israelis and
Palestinians in here smoking together. Even people who don’t smoke come here to
have their photo taken. It’s part of the history of Amsterdam.”
But now
Mellow Yellow looks set to be history as the mayor, Eberhard van der Laan,
oversees the final phase of a government-backed programme to shut down any
coffeeshop within 250m of a school. Mellow Yellow is one of 28 establishments
to be affected by the initiative, which is allegedly aimed at deterring
youngsters from taking up cannabis.
Mr Petram,
33, has hired a lawyer to help him fight the closure of Mellow Yellow. His main
line of defence is that the nearby school is actually a hairdressing academy
for fee-paying students, most of whom are 18 years old.
“They are closing the world’s oldest
coffeeshop because of a salon,” claims Mr Petram, whose personal future is at
stake. “If we close on January 1, I will still have to pay €7,000 rent every
month. How am I going to afford that if this place shuts? I don’t know what I’m
going to do.”
Acting with
unusual candour, the mayor’s office told Telegraph Travel that it doesn’t
believe closing coffeeshops will stop young people from taking up cannabis.
The city
hall council has pushed through a programme to "clean up" the red
light district, forcing a further 22 coffeeshops to close
However, it
is pushing the directive through as part of a deal with the national government
that will exempt Amsterdam from enforcing the so-called Weed Pass, which
prohibits non-Dutch nationals from visiting coffeeshops.
The Weed
Pass has already been rolled out in other parts of the Netherlands, but
Amsterdam has hitherto resisted the scheme, claiming it would lead to an
explosion in street dealing.
“If we
don’t strike a deal we would be forced to enforce the Weed Pass - and then we
will have big problems,” says Jasper Karman, the mayor’s spokesperson,
defending the recent closures.
Critics
claim kowtowing to the government was a mistake: with an election looming next
year, there is no guarantee a new administration would honour any agreements
made with the previous government.
Detractors
also claim the initiative, though touted as a nationwide scheme, specifically
targetted Amsterdam.
“Other
cities in Holland have already closed most of their coffeeshops, so this law
doesn’t even affect them - it was aimed at Amsterdam,” says August de Loor, a
government advisor and founder of the Bond Van Cannabis Detaillisten (BCD)
union for coffeeshop owners. “The city has been tricked.”
There is
one point that all sides can agree on: that half of Amsterdam’s coffeeshops
have closed in the last two decades. Back in the Nineties there were as many as
350 of the cafes scattered around the city, today there are just 175.
Some have
closed naturally, others have been forced to fold because their owners violated
the strict rules governing coffeeshops. Most of the recent closures, however,
are down to local policy; in addition to the “school rule”, the city hall
council has also pushed through a programme to "clean up" the red
light district, forcing a further 22 coffeeshops to close.
“The council wants to increase the quality of
the city centre, but only for rich people,” laments Mr de Loor. “I’m all for
increasing the quality of the city centre, but not by kicking out coffeeshops.”
The local
government made its case for gentrifying the red light district to Telegraph
Travel.
“We had an
enormous amount of coffeeshops, sex shops and brothels in the area and we
wanted to make it more diverse and more attractive to a broader public,” says
Mr Karman. “We wanted to create a better balance.”
Though
considered a form of lowbrow entertainment by some, coffeeshops play a vital
role in Dutch tourism: according to city hall figures, 25-30 per cent of
tourists in Amsterdam visit a coffeeshop.
“Within five to ten years coffeeshops could be
finished,” says Mr de Loor
Coffeeshops
are also part of the social fabric of Amsterdam.
“They are
meeting points, like pubs; they bring people together and help keep the city
cosy,” says Mr de Loor. “They are part of our culture, something unique to
Holland.”
According
to Mr de Loor, the closure of coffeeshops in Amsterdam is having an adverse
effect on those that remain, as well as pushing more smokers onto the
street.
“The
coffeeshops that have survived are getting busier and they are kicking out the
chairs - kicking out the social part of the coffeeshop - to essentially become
cannabis supermarkets,” he said. “You go in, buy your weed and f*** off. That’s
a terrible development.”
Perhaps the
biggest concern for Amsterdam’s coffeeshops, however, is the threat of a new
national government. After Brexit and Trump, locals are increasingly fearful
that a right-wing party could prevail at next year’s elections, thus spelling
the end of coffeeshops as we know them.
“Within
five to ten years coffeeshops could be finished,” says Mr de Loor. “That’s my
most negative scenario.”
City hall
says it has no plans to close any more coffeeshops in Amsterdam; it even moots
the idea of opening others in the future, assuming the government doesn’t
impose further restrictions.
That’s
scant consolation for Mr Petram and his customers. Unless city hall changes its
mind soon, Mellow Yellow will slide into the history books.
“There are
other coffeeshops, but they don’t have the same atmosphere,” says Rasta, a
regular at Mellow Yellow. “I don’t know where I’d go if this place closed.”
Amsterdam
has become ‘unlivable’ as residents fight back to stop ‘Disneyfication’ of city
Residents fear that neighbourhoods are being taken over by tourists
Gavin
Haines, amsterdam
2 DECEMBER
2016 • 11:28AM
It’s Friday
morning and the invasion has already begun. Armed with suitcases and heady
expectations, a steady stream of tourists are trickling out of Amsterdam’s
Central Station, among them stag parties from Britain, whose mischievous smiles
and boisterous behaviour suggests a hedonistic weekend lies ahead.
According
to the Dutch tourist board more than 5.2 million tourists descended on
Amsterdam last year, a fifth of whom came from Britain. That’s a lot of
visitors for any destination to deal with, but it’s particularly challenging
for a diminutive city like Amsterdam, which has a population of just 800,000.
“It’s
unlivable here at the weekend,” laments local resident, Bert Nap, whose
mezzanine apartment overlooks Achterburgwal canal. “I have a small place in the
country and I go there at the weekend just to escape.”
Mr Nap, an
author, lives in his cosy canalside flat with his wife and daughter. Once upon
a time the building was part of a convent; ironically it’s now part of
Amsterdam’s notorious red light district.
But it’s
not the local sex workers that Mr Nap blames for bringing the neighbourhood
down, it’s tourists. Or to be more specific, Airbnb.
“The
neighbourhood has changed from a resident-based neighbourhood to a
tourist-based neighbourhood,” he says. “We have different neighbours every
week.”
Those who
are left are not living in their own neighbourhood anymore
Bert Nap,
resident
Mr Nap
represents a growing number of residents in Amsterdam who believe tourism in
the city is becoming unsustainable, as more homeowners turf tenants out to make
way for high-yield holidaymakers.
“There’s a
feeling that those who are left are not living in their own neighbourhood
anymore,” he sighs. “Amsterdam is starting to look like a playground for
visitors; what people call Disneyfication.”
The local
police has also expressed fears that crowds in Amsterdam are swelling to the
point of being dangerous.
Similar
scenarios are playing out in cities like Venice, San Francisco and Barcelona,
where peer-to-peer accommodation websites such as Airbnb are being blamed for
undermining the character of those destinations.
“The
originality of the city centre is slipping away,” Mr Nap tells me. “Things are
getting out of balance.”
But not for
much longer, perhaps: yesterday Amsterdam and Airbnb signed a landmark
agreement that could have implications that are felt way beyond the Dutch
capital.
Under the
new agreement, Airbnb has agreed to introduce a mechanism on its website that
will make it impossible for users in Amsterdam to rent their properties out for
longer than 60 days per annum.
The Airbnb
agreement could have implications that are felt way beyond Amsterdam
Airbnb has
also agreed to implement a new online tool for people living near its
properties in Amsterdam, allowing them to raise concerns about a listing,
including noise complaints.
The city
government, meanwhile, has agreed to introduce a new 24-hour hotline for
residents to raise concerns about Airbnb properties. Cities around the world
will be paying close attention.
“The
pioneering collaboration between Airbnb and Amsterdam is unique to the city,”
said a government spokesperson.
“Amsterdam will now seek similar agreements with other accommodation
platforms.”
In what was
perhaps a swipe at other cities around the world - including San Francisco,
which has taken Airbnb to court - the accommodation site commended Amsterdam
for its collaborative approach.
“The new
measures are an example to the world and demonstrate the positive results that
can be achieved when policymakers and Airbnb work together on our shared goals
of making cities better places to live, work and visit,” said James McClure,
Airbnb general manager for Northern Europe.
In addition
to reining in Airbnb, the city government told Telegraph Travel that it is
exploring other measures to halt the so-called Disneyfication of Amsterdam,
including a moratorium on new hotels.
We have
decided to put a stop to new hotels in the city centre
Krista
Verweij, city spokesperson
“We are
trying to get a grip on growth,” says Sebastiaan Meijer, a spokesperson for the
mayor’s office. “In some part of the city we are not allowing any new hotels
and in other parts of the city we will be really strict.”
The local
government also plans to move the cruise terminal outside the city centre and
prohibit sightseeing coaches from driving through downtown Amsterdam. It is
also banning the so-called “beer bikes” that have popped up in cities across
Europe.
“There are
a lot of other things we are looking at including putting more [law
enforcement] officers on the streets,” said Meijer. “We are being more strict
on people who misbehave.”
The latter
measure is a response to unruly stag groups who, much to the chagrin of
residents, have become a common feature in the city.
“I’m not
against tourists, but I want to see some sort of normality,” says Mr Nap. “For
a long time we have been cast aside as people who are moaning. Now the council
is listening.
Residents fear that neighbourhoods are being
taken over by tourists
“It
recognises that [tourism] is not self-regulating and that there has to be
regulation from above.”
Mr Nap
welcomes the agreement struck between Amsterdam and Airbnb, but he is concerned
that some residents will circumnavigate the new rules by listing their
properties on multiple rental platforms.
“I don’t
think it’s strict enough, but we shall see,” he says. “The inner city has
reached saturation point; the cement of Amsterdam is weakening.”
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