Bijlmer: City of the Future, Part 1 | Hacker News Reader

Bijlmer: City of the Future, Part 1

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55 pointsIntronExon22 comments

The Bijlmermeer (which is the official name) is a collosal failure. It's the closest thing to a ghetto that the Netherlands has. The city has sunk massive funds into attempts to improve things with some very limited effect. In the end the decision was made to tear down a large number of the flats (in one part aided by a cargo 747 that crashed right on top of one of the flats), but even that could not get rid the area of its stigma.

If you want to read more about it the wikipedia page (in Dutch) has a ton more information:

https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bijlmermeer_(Amsterdam)

The last few years have seen things improve a bit, but it is nowhere near an integral part of Amsterdam, and the only reason people live there is because it is cheap or they have nowhere else to go (such as: Almere, Hoofddorp, Zaandam, Lelystad, Hoorn and Purmerend which are the other satellite cities of Amsterdam attracting the people the original Bijlmermeer was intended to house).

It's such a shame this seems to be part one of a multipart article, it's really well written. I think part 2 will have more about what you mentioned, including the crash.

The most interesting part to me about the crash is that it embodies everything that's wrong with planning things on a large scale. The plan reflected the utopian view of the original architect, rather than the real life needs of the people that ended up living there. As one of our town council members put it 'Nobody ever tried to make a whole city happy with endless space to fish and walk'.

Actually "Plan Zuid" comes pretty close imho, even 100 years later a great area to life.

* https://www.heerevanderschaar.amsterdam/bouwondernemer/plan-...

But fortunately for what is now 'nieuw zuid' but actually pretty old it always was an integral part of the city. Bijlmer started out geographically isolated without anything else to do there but sleep.

Incidentally I grew up in 'de pijp' which is right next door to mr. Berlage's creations so I know the area like my back pocket and went to school there for years.

Don't tear it down just yet. Housing prices are rising there fast now as well, attracting a new group of people that might invest in it to make it more liveable.

https://nos.nl/artikel/2216260-zelfs-goedkope-wijken-worden-...

> Don't tear it down just yet.

Most of what was torn down will (hopefully) stay torn down, and what remains standing will probably remain a while longer.

> Housing prices are rising there fast now as well

That's because of an extensive renovation plan that took over two decades to take root.

The bigger driving factor is that Amsterdam housing prices have risen to the point that they made the Bijlmer look viable again.

I've had quite a bit of family and friends living in the Bijlmer, the whole place has a super turbulent history and it has been a very expensive and real life study in how large scale plans can go off the rails. Something similar but on a much smaller scale happened in Amsterdam Noord (Plan van Gool).

I'm a foreigner living in Amsterdam and I'm assuming you're Dutch. Look, the Bijlmer area is certainly problematic within Dutch standards, and I would just call it a massive failure within these standards. Really, there are no no-go areas in this country and it's a very well accomplished land in many societal parameters, when comparing to the world. I'd call a colossal failure the city I'm from, Rio de Janeiro.

It's all relative, that's for sure. I've lived in lots of different places and indeed, by Dutch standards the Bijlmer is a collosal failure, at the same time it is obvious that that is the context. This is a country that is pretty big on making stuff work, if not for that the country itself wouldn't even exist. Engineering on this scale is nothing strange to the Dutch mentality at all, turning sea into land or having Eifel-tower sized movable dams to keep out the water is something people don't even bat an eye at (probably because they are unaware of the feats of engineering underpinning that).

That there are much worse places in the world I readily concede, but it did not at all turn out how it was meant to be and that's what differentiates Bijlmermeer from the rest of the Netherlands and how major planning is done here, and that is why to me it is a collosal failure.

By the way: welcome to our little rainy country!

Bedankt! (Thank you, in Dutch)

It seems to me that the only relevant standards to compare it with are Dutch. Obviously the overall standard of living in NL (and most surrounding countries) is high, from a global perspective. It does not make the failure any less spectacular for me. And for the no-go areas in NL.. There is a strong political will here, and in neighboring countries, to defend this stance; It has become some sort of a mantra. I would argue that there are plenty of no-go areas in NL. Yes, Honduras is worse, so is Sudan, or whatever, but in reality there are many places that people will not go, or would be comfortable letting there loved ones go, because of safety concerns. You could compare this to some failed state/city anywhere in the world, or you could argue that anybody should be relatively safe (and feel as such) anytime of the day. The Bijlmer really is a "shithole" by any standard. (I am Dutch)

> I would argue that there are plenty of no-go areas in NL.

Your username indicates you're Dutch. I do wonder if you're aware of the common definition of a no-go area? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No-go_area.

From Wikipedia: "A "no-go area" (or "no-go zone") is an area that has a reputation for violence and crime which makes people frightened to go there, an area in a town barricaded off to civil authorities by a force such as a paramilitary, or an area barred to certain individuals or groups.[1] It has also been used to refer to areas undergoing insurgency where ruling authorities have lost control and are unable to enforce sovereignty.[2]"

There's a few areas where people might not like to walk there at night. There are NO no go areas though.

A friend works for the city of Rotterdam. South of Rotterdam has a similar reputation as the Bijlmer. Whenever they show around South of Rotterdam to city officials from other countries those officials almost always ask when they'll arrive to the problematic area; this while standing right in that area (e.g. Afrikaanderbuurt).

You want to argue no-go areas? Go ahead..

> Your username indicates you're Dutch.

I also explicitly stated this at the end of my comment ;)

One of the three definitions you gave states: > "an area that has a reputation for violence and crime which makes people frightened to go there"

Just this week, the mayor of Nijmegen (medium sized city in the East of the Netherlands) asked people not to go to ATMs in low traffic locations due to spikes in violent robberies.

The Bijlmer also has a reputation for violence and crime, which makes people frightened to go there. This goes quite a bit further than simply "not liking to walk there at night".

No, we are not in Brazil, Honduras, or Sudan. Yes, especially when you go during the day, with a local government delegation no less, most of it will appear extremely safe and clean and well-organized etc. I also had some wonderful times in cities in Honduras. One of those is in every list of most violent / dangerous cities of the world.

I have no strong desire to argue no-go areas, but I just find it dangerous and unproductive to ignore real problems because I believe that society is fragile and requires constant attention. Akin to the broken window theory.

Not many barricaded off areas to civil authorities in NL, by force of a paramilitary. Let's keep it that way, and make it even better.

If this topic interests you, read about the development of "Plan West" (+6000 houses) and "Plan Zuid" (+2000 houses) both in Amsterdam.

* https://www.indonesia-investments.com/about-us/who-we-are/ou...?

Architecture here is held up as the core issue, but close examination shows design isn't even relevant. This complex in the Netherlands was not connected to transportation and became host to concentrated poverty which we now know is socially toxic. Pruitt Igor receives mention, but it was intended from the start to host concentrated poverty and was built so cheaply that it was falling apart when first residents moved in and proved to be impossible to maintain.

Just one interesting contrasting development is the Barbican in London which is not only a dehumanizing tower complex but also built in the now largely disliked Brutalist style. The Barbican has all of the design flaws called out and yet is a popular, fully occupied, and highly desirable success.

If you want to have a meaningful impact on design then you will have to stop lying about concrete tower block development.

For those not from the Netherlands (and since the second part of the article is not out yet). The Bijlmer was struck by a disaster known as the 'bijlmerramp' (dutch for: Bijlmer disaster) in 1992 when a 747 cargo plane crashed on one of the structures.

See [0] (Dutch) and [1] (English):

[0] https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bijlmerramp

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Al_Flight_1862

I really love 99% Invisible podcast. Fantastically executed stories.

I'm really not a fan of this architecture. I think it would be pretty depressing not to have a clear view over the horizon in some direction.

I’ve lived in the Bijlmer for two years and had a wonderful time. The streets are clean, has great restaurants and the people are warm, kind and generous (within a few days neighbors dropped by with delicious leftovers of a birthday dinner as a welcome gift). I never experienced any trouble or felt unsafe while I lived there. Perhaps people perceive it to be a failure because the majority of inhabitants happen to be black.

I've lived there for five years, and like you, I'm always very surprised by all the articles and comments made by people about the Bijlmer (about it being the worst place ever..) But all these people tend to have one thing in common, they have never lived or even visited the Bijlmer, or indeed tend to be a bit racist. It's sad, because it is not a failure at all. In retrospect I even believe it's one of the most unique places The Netherlands has to offer.

Hilarious. I've known the Bijlmer intimately since roughly 1980, my mom lived there for quite a while, and extended family has lived there since the early 1970's and continue to live there today. I've seen parts of it being built (the later sections), school mates in 1977 lived there and I used to bike there regularly.

Gliphoeve, Kelbergen and other areas of the Bijlmer were so bad at some point that the police did not want to go there unless they went as a team. Robberies were on the order of the day, drug use in the subway stations and on the trains was so common nobody even noticed any more. The parking garages were essentially chopshops by night.

At a guess you have only seen the Bijlmer since long after the attempts to clean it all up have started. Maybe you'd believe my mom who had to get a large dog just to be able to make it from the shopping center to her house without being molested or robbed?

If you feel the Bijlmer is one of the most unique places NL has to offer then you are definitely part of some exquisite group of people with acquired tastes, the vast majority of the people that I know that have lived there and have moved out were happy to finally leave it all behind them.

How common? I just ask because I moved from a country where many people I know, including myself, have been violently robbed or attacked at one point in their lives (england), to Germany - where I've never even heard of somebody getting mugged.

The Germans are pretty unaware of how safe it is here, on the whole - they'll often explain to me a particular street is dangerous, or an area is bad - but honestly, if you're from any other country, it's a bit ridiculous.

I mean, feeling unsafe is bad - but to put it in perspective, one of my german friends lived in Coventry for a short while. On his second day there, he was beaten up at a bus stop for having long hair. That's what an unsafe area is like in england, which I'm sure is far more mild than most places in the world.

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