There is almost a complete lack of anything that feels commercial mixing with anything that feels residential, beyond especially designated spaces, usually the very center of town.
These suburbs are not conventionally pretty, certainly not in the way downtown Amsterdam, Haarlem, or Leiden are. They are both monotonous and discordant, because the Dutch have perfected an architectural style of varied repetition. They will build twenty to fifty of the exact same weird thing, then next door build a hundred to two hundred of a very different weird thing.
While they can have very clashing outward appearances, they are united in a utilitarian practicality with a focus on providing almost everyone an elementary apartment.
The result of this is that there are two very different urban Netherlands — the older downtowns, with exquisite row homes along canals, medieval churches, cafe-heavy central squares that are frozen into place by historical preservation, and jammed with tourists, and then there are the outer rings of bizarre Lego-like perfunctory two-story apartment complexes, with few if any shops, beyond an Aldi, a hair saloon, a weed store, and maybe a bike-repair stand.
https://walkingtheworld.substack.com/p/walking-the-netherlan... (paywalled, alas)