| Alexander Norris | |
| Montreal Gazette |
Saturday, August 28, 2004
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AMSTERDAM -- The first thing you see stepping out of Central Station into the heart of this laid-back city is not the canals or the boats or the tall, narrow houses or the sex shops or the legendary "coffee houses" -- but the bicycles. Thousands of them, locked to every available stand, fence and pole.
The Dutch, more than any other Europeans, have made cycling part of their daily lives. Children and pensioners, students and workers, police officers and drug dealers, bohemians and snappily attired professionals can all be seen pedalling their way through the narrow streets and over the canals that crisscross Amsterdam.
According to municipal government estimates, nearly half of all traffic movements in this city are by bike. Even among those age 75 and older, a recent survey showed, about one quarter of all trips in cities throughout the Netherlands are done by bicycle.
So it only make sense for visitors to do the same.
Almost as soon as I hopped on my sturdy rented single-speeder, I was struck by how well Amsterdam is set up for cyclists.
Bicycle-only lanes are everywhere, often with special lights for directing bicycle traffic at intersections. Bike stands are common, too.
In fact, bicycles appear to be far more numerous than cars here. And as you whisk past the cars and trucks inching their way along the city's narrow streets, it's easy to see why.
And with all the cycling going on, it's also easy to see why the Netherlands has one of the lowest obesity rates in the industrialized world.
By virtue of their sheer numbers, cyclists appear to have reduced the hazards of two-wheel travel. Although helmets are rarely used, injury and fatality rates are far lower than in North America -- no doubt because cyclists aren't forced to weave in and out of car and truck traffic to get around.
The geography helps. Most of Amsterdam is flat as a pancake, as is the surrounding countryside.
But grassroots efforts have also played a role in making Amsterdam the cyclists' haven that it is today. Protests in the late 1970s -- in which tens of thousands of cyclists disrupted traffic in the central city -- laid the groundwork for a cyclists' movement that has successfully pressed for bike-friendly reforms, says sociologist Hans Pruijt of Erasmus University in Rotterdam.
Today, with about 400 kilometres of bike paths in the city and an extensive network of bike routes in the nearby countryside, there are enough options to keep the determined cyclist busy here for weeks.
The main concern is bike theft: at least one-tenth of the city's 600,000 bikes are stolen every year. But authorities have responded by setting up 25 guarded bike sheds where one can leave one's two-wheeler without worrying that it will be nabbed.
Aside from theft, perhaps the biggest worry is getting your bicycle wheel stuck in one of the tram rails, or bumping into a disoriented tourist pedestrian who stumbles on to one of the special bike lanes.
Getting a bike is a snap. Rental shops are easy to find, and a simple one-speeder can be had for between six and 10 Euros ($10 to $16 Cdn) a day.
A number of mapped-out bike routes were suggested by tourism officials and bike shop attendants I encountered. Some led out of the city, past windmills and alongside dikes. Others featured museums and other cultural attractions.
The most improbable of them all was something advertised as the coffee shop cycling tour -- a zig-zag route leading from one marijuana-vending establishment to another. It was hard to imagine how even the best-intentioned pothead stopping in at each one of these businesses could successfully navigate past the second or third such outlet, let alone to all 30 on this route.
I've always avoided mapped-out tours when taking in a new city, preferring to meander from place to place as the spirit moves me. So I threw the maps into my packsack and let my instincts be my guide.
I first headed into the the central part of town, taking in the 17th- and 18th-century architecture and watching people go about their daily lives. The red-light district was so packed with pedestrians that I found it easier to lock my bike and proceed on foot. But the sight of tourists gazing through windows at scantily clad prostitutes struck me as depressing, so I hopped back on to my bike and headed south, arriving within minutes in a heavily immigrant-based neighbourhood.
With minorities from Suriname, Indonesia and other far-flung corners of the former Dutch empire, as well as immigrants from Turkey, Africa, the Mediterranean and south Asia, Amsterdam is one of the most ethnically diverse cities in Europe.
That means there's no shortage of cuisines to choose from here. I tried some excellent Indonesian gado gado. But my favourite discovery was the Israeli falafel shops. Featuring crispy falafel balls and extra-fresh, diced vegetables, this was the most delicious Middle Eastern fast food I'd sampled anywhere. And it was consistently good, wherever I tried it -- the perfect curbside snack for a hungry cyclist.
After a quick hop over to the Vondelpark, a pleasant expanse of landscaped green space full of long, narrow ponds, I ended my day by heading back north to Jordaan -- a historically working-class neighbourhood that has become one of the most sought-after districts in the city.
Sprinkled with cafes, bars and bookstores and lovely tree-lined canals, all within a short walk of the central city, the neighbourhood held an undeniable appeal.
It was easy to see why so many people wanted to live here, I thought. Now if only I could learn some Dutch.
