Amsterdam, Europe Brief News – Smoking cannabis on the street in Amsterdam’s red light district will soon be illegal, the city council has announced.
The decision came as part of a range of bylaws designed to deter tourist excesses and make life more bearable for despairing local people.
With more than 18 million visitors thronging its narrow 17th-century streets last year, Amsterdam’s residents have long complained that the busiest parts of the city centre, including De Wallen – the red light district – were becoming unlivable.
The council said in a statement that smoking joints in public in the inner city would be outlawed from mid-May, adding that it was prepared to consider extending the ban to the terraces of cannabis “coffeeshops” if necessary.
The Amsterdam newspaper Het Parool called the measures “historic”, noting that for decades Amsterdam had been known worldwide as the city “where everything was possible and everything was permissible – including smoking weed on the street”.
More recently, however, it added, “overtourism” had made the inner city unlivable. Foreign tourists and domestic visitors “make a lot of noise, urinate in the street, vomit, and treat the red light district as an amusement park, not a residential area”.
Under the legislation, young people will be able to legally grow up to four cannabis plants per household.
