Amsterdam’s canals to be added to UNESCO World Heritage List

DutchAmsterdam.nl — Amsterdam’s historic grachtengordel (literally, belt of canals) around the city’s center will be added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in July, a spokesman for the organization has said.

Kishore Rao, Deputy Director of the UNESCO World Heritage Centre in Paris made the announcement last Saturday during the official designation of the Netherlands’ Wadden Sea as a World Heritage site.

Amsterdam’s ‘belt’ of canals around the city’s center

That the canal belt makes the list is a good thing, says Walther Schoonenberg of the Vereniging Vrienden van de Amsterdamse Binnenstad (VVAB) (Friends of Amsterdam’s City Center).

“Thirty European cities already are on the heritage list. It would be extremely absurd if Amsterdam with one of the nicest and best-preserved urban centers would not be on that list.”

Schoonenberg expects the designation will upgrade the city’s image abroad, bringing along more tourists.

“Hopefully other tourists,” he says. “The emphasis will be on culture rather than on sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll. More people wil come for culture, museums and canals than for the Red Light District,” Schoonenberg believes.

Amsterdam’s historic canals [View larger]

But some critics say official UNESCO rules and regulations covering the care, presentation and and preservation of World Heritage sites may hamper Amsterdam’s ambition to grow the city into a creative metropolis.

Others claim such rules may damage the city’s laid-back reputation, and some opponents who live in or near the canal belt fear the designation will lead to higher rental rates and house prices.

In August last year UNESCO advisers were ’shocked’ by the sight of huge billboard and video screens covering buildings in Amsterdam’s historic city center, which has been nominated for World Heritage Site status.

Some locals have viewed the city’s efforts at cleaning up the Red Light District as an attempt to gentrify the area in order to curry favor with UNESCO.
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