This was published 3 years ago
Amsterdam's red light district to be moved away from city centre
Tourists walking in the red light district of Amsterdam, where prostitutes try to lure customers from behind their window.Credit: iStock
Amsterdam's infamous brothel windows will be closed and a new red light district set up away from the city centre, councillors have decided.
City mayor Femke Alsema received strong support from multiple political parties for her proposal to relocate the De Wallen red light district, The Guardian reported.
Alsema first proposed the move in mid-2019, arguing that sex workers had become a tourist attraction, drawing stares and abuse.
Workers will be invited to move to a new "erotic centre" elsewhere in the Netherlands' capital, the precise location of which is yet to be determined.
Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte's party VVD has backed the proposal, along with the Dutch Labour party, Greens, CDA and ChristenUnie.
Dennis Boutkan of the Labour party said the move would "reset" Amsterdam as a visitor city.
The CDA's Diederik Boutkan said tourists were "welcome to enjoy the beauty and freedom of the city, but not at any cost".
Lobby group Red Light United previously claimed that 90 per cent of female sex workers it had surveyed wanted to be based in the windows that line the network of narrow canal-side streets and alleyways that make up the red light district.
A group member going by the pseudonym Foxxy told local newspaper Het Parool that relocating workers was "not an option" as "the customers will not know where to find the sex workers".
She asked whether the council was going to organise buses to transport customers to Westelijk Havengebied, north of the city centre.
However, councillors agreed the move was necessary to change the type of tourists the central city attracts.
Amsterdam is also looking to ban tourists from another key attraction in an effort to clean up its image: its coffee shops.
Under Halsema's proposal. Only Dutch residents would be allowed to enter the cannabis-dealing outlets.
The plan, backed by local police and prosecutors, is aimed at tackling the flow of hard drugs and organised crime linked to the marijuana trade.
Halsema said she wanted to "shrink" the cannabis market to make it more manageable.
"The residence condition is far-reaching, but I see no alternative," she said.
However, Halsema is struggling to win support for this proposal because of fears it would hand the cannabis trade over to street dealers, Het Parool reported.
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