Comments by "Lynott Parris" (@DenUitvreter) on "The Netherlands is a Giant City" video.

My take away is that the relatively short distances of the Netherlands are used to promote the idea that it's a city state which it is not. The idea that km's determine the difference between a city and a country is nonsense. This city idea also comes with the claim that you can govern it like a city and it can have it's big city problems. What a coincidence, just when government is trying to get the farmers out with made up crises and keeps adding to the population like it's a force of nature. The Netherlands has been and is such a success because it has it's two sides balancing eachother out. The dry parts and the wet parts, the country side and urban area's, the down to earth people and those with their head in the clouds. It's in that interaction between those the country emerged, the first country as such in fact, the first nation state in fact, a country as we've come to know countries. So the place that came up with the idea of being a country is not a country but a city? Yeah right.
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No, the Netherlands has amazing cycling infrastructure because the Dutch cycle. The myth is that this is or was a government decision that could be copied by other governments.
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@leonpaelinck Yes and no. The country fell madly in love with the car but also a lot of people kept cycling and protested when that got too hard and when the streets became unsafe to play in for their kids. It clashed really quickly also because the Dutch were late with mass motorization because of the recovery from the war. The point was that government followed the people, it didn't lead. The infrastructure had to keep up with demand, that kept growing with more infrastructure.
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@DanDanDoe The Dutch already cycled more, they kept cycling in big numbers, not just a few parents protested but lots of people, including drivers, it also had to do with the street as playground for the children, and there were the squatters protesting the demolishing of old city parts for new buildings with roads for the cars. The vote in Amsterdam was extremely close, 1 vote and large parts of the city would have been demolished. Very little infrastructure was build in the 70's and 80's, Utrecht was still holding on to the new projects very much if I am not mistaken, most political parties were still very much ready to make room for the cars allthough accepting the bicycle was gonna stay. Our prime minister's party, who now flaunts the cycling, has remained a considerable force against it until at least the late nineties. What really did a lot was the limit on big box stores at the edge of the city that had been there since the 50's and was not motivated by cycling, the traffic rules like in Groningen in 1977 to discourage car driving in and around the center, changing the number and the ratio bike/car in an area, the woonerfs, also pre 70's, and the liability rules of the early 90's. That together with the broad public acceptance, also among drivers that cycling simply had to be. it's a cycling and walking culture that has generated infrastructure, not the other way around. If the Dutch had waited around for taking the bike until the current levels of cycling infrastructure, we wouldn't have gotten it. It's great and I love it, and I would like the example followed internationally, but it's the people that have to follow the example too.
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@yaush_ I can see the advantages and why people are jealous. Just don't pretend your government can achieve that too while it was not Dutch government's achievement. The English cycled a lot too in the 50s, but they had to show off they could afford a car. That's culture too.
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