Amsterdam introduces new measures to further limit nuisance of mass tourism

The city of Amsterdam has come up with new measures to reduce the number of nuisance tourists visiting the Dutch capital. Banning hotels from adding more beds, redistributing coffee shops and forcing various establishments to close earlier are some of the ways the municipality plans to crack down on overtourism.

75 measures and counting to reduce Amsterdam overtourism

With Amsterdam seeing 10 tourists per resident in 2023, the Dutch city is clearly, to the chagrin of the city’s inhabitants, one of the most popular tourist destinations in the world. Despite over 75 measures introduced by the city to deter nuisance tourists, visitors from abroad still keep rolling in. 

Some of the measures that have already been taken include multiple Stay Away campaigns, cutting river cruises, a ban on the construction of new hotels, bans on alcohol and cannabis consumption in the Red Light District and more. Now the city has announced plans to add even more measures in hopes that they will counteract the growth in the number of tourists.

Amsterdam hotels banned from adding more beds

With Amsterdam having already put a stop to the construction of new hotels, many have resorted to outside-the-box thinking and are currently increasing the number of sleeping places during renovations, construction and expansions. They do this by adding sleeping pods or bunk beds into existing rooms.

Now that the city has caught on, adding extra sleeping places to a hotel has been “prohibited with immediate effect”. In this way, the municipality hopes to keep the number of tourist overnight stays below their goal limit of 20 million people.

Improving quality of life in Amsterdam city centre

According to a statement by the municipality, Amsterdam is also working on other measures “to improve the quality of life in the city centre”. Firstly, the Street Dealers Approach will be extended from 24 to 48 hours. This measure bars dealers who are arrested by police in the city centre from returning to the area for two whole days instead of just one.

The city is also looking into earlier closing times for sex theatres in the Red Light District and cafe terraces, and expanding the area where earlier closing times for restaurants and bars are implemented. Furthermore, the municipality is also considering supplementing a real estate fund for Amsterdam city centre to purchase properties and buy out catering or tourism operations.

Spreading out coffee shops in Amsterdam

In Amsterdam’s city centre, there are a whopping 90 coffee shops - more than the number of coffee shops in the whole of Utrecht, The Hague and Rotterdam combined. According to the city, the locations in Amsterdam are mainly visited by tourists from abroad and cause quite a bit of nuisance from Dutch residents.

To limit this, the municipality wants to spread out the coffee shops across the whole of Amsterdam so they aren’t all concentrated in the city centre. How they will do this is by making it easier for coffee shops to move to other locations in the city. 

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