Linear Version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IAjNdRfT788
Active Towns Hear from a Houten resident: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ureekp5HpUI
Netherlands By Bike Series👉 https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL49bxTPhfjjlKx9RQY-HgREh4CE6J8xH2&si=0dBA_yVeU8G1lrSd
The city of Houten has interested me for quite a while. I was elated to finally have the chance to visit. One thing we should take away from that beautiful little city is that it’s possible to build new places where the car does not dominate.
0:00 Netherlands Bike trip Day 4
0:58 15 Minute City Conspiracy Theory
1:30 What is a 15 minute city
1:55 The best 15 minute city
2:36 History of Houten
3:48 Bicycle green-ways
4:27 Modal filtering
5:23 Driving in Houten
6:15 Housing
6:53 This is possible
8:25 Gouda
9:31 Country Road bike paths
11:47 Cycling Capital of the Netherlands
12:58 Busiest bike lane in the world
13:40 Evening adventure
43 Comments
As for pronunciation of Dutch towns, I went for the shotgun approach in the hopes that I got it right at least once.
Pretty awesome editing; informative, creative and with variety & humor. Great!
9:56 I instantly knew what happened haha
As a Dutch cyclist one cannot underestimate the mosquitos, in our low lands riddled with waterways and inches away from being the swamps they used to be, especialy early morning or close to sunset.
In typical Dutch fashion we would call this "gratis proteinen" (free proteins)
(edit: lol you got the spirit there, you said it yourself, "extra protein" haha)
Great video once again, I didn't mind the timeline distortion at all by the way.
Please tell me you went or are going to the bicycle parking garage at Utrecht Centraal. I believe it's "a new world wonder" 😉
Jeebs sad to hear Rhijnauwen sucked. It's my favorite ride along the Kromme Rijn. Totally not allowed but somehow I always get a pass if I run into a warden.
Houten is not a 15 minute city. 15 minute city is a foreign social engineering concept that wants to claim Dutch cities and towns it had nothing to do with. Social engineering and 15 minute cities are top down, Dutch cycling never was. The Dutch like to cycle, also there were it isn't flat, and government followed with infrastructure to meet the demands, not the other way around. If the Dutch had waited for this infrastructure to cycle they would never have got it.
It's completely fair from foreign cycling advocates to use the Netherlands as an example and to demand infrastructure from their governments, but they misrepresent as top down thing, as a government initiative they apparently want. I can't agree with that.
Utereg me stadsie
Why am i not suprised that covid turned everything into a conspiracy
Houten is not a city. It does not have city rights, which you obviously need to be able to call yourself 'city'.
I would really call Houten a 15 minute suburb. Although you can cycle to everything in Houten, most Houten residents work in Utrecht or Amsterdam and commute by car. The municipality of Houten is the municipality with the highest car ownership per household of the Netherlands, so more than bikes cars are still the main mode of transport. The modality share you quote is for travel within Houten, but due to the suburb nature of Houten a lot of trips are actually to places outside of Houten.
The 15 minutes city concept doesn't really apply to the Netherlands since we have mixed-use neighbourhoods by default here. Every city/town in the Netherlands is a 15 minutes city.
Thank you for making a video of Houten. I love living here as a cyclist fanatic. Its not as boring as you might think though. There is a lot to do quite often. But as you said we are not far from most big cities as we are basically in the centre of the country. Also we are close to the Woods and rivers. Perfect for cyclist!
Bro what, you call it 'The Netherlands by Bike' but you barely left the Randstad/Holland area 😭😭😭😭😭 I was like 'surely in the last episodes he will go further east, north or south right? And enjoy actual quiet and what you can call nature by our standards?'. Nope, back to Amsterdam. 😢
9:36 random 'Murica
Houten is my hometown, i now live in Zeist but part of my familiy still lives in Houten. Too bad for you that you didn't sleep at the stayokay in Bunnik. It's in your video around minute 12:10–12:30 and it has a youth hostel that is very good.
Nice video!
locals dont say UtrechT, we say utreg. just saying
Yeah,
My country is beautifull.
Every time I watch Netherlands cities videos, I don't know whether I get excited or extremely depressed to know I'll never live in a place like that.
At 6:32 there is a shot with the traditional willow pollards of the Netherlands.
But you will notice that some are cut and some are not.
The councils are encouraged to stagger their maintenance like that so that biodiversity can flourish.
The older stems give ample opportunity for birds to nest but if you cut all the trees at once the birds will be without nesting sites for that year. Alternatively the young shoots are more edible to most insect life that specializes on willow (most insect species with a caterpillar stage are 'species specific', meaning that they can only overcome the resistances of a couple of trees/plants). Not only do the birds benefit, so do the caterpillars/insects. And then in turn the birds because they eat the insects and feed the caterpillars to their babies!
If you find this kind of thing interesting, look up a talk called 'Doug Tallamy: Restoring Nature's Relationships'
You are dead wrong… In Canada it is forcely forbidden to go outside your 15min concentration camp. So it WILL also be rolled out here
Millhouses town
Well excuse me. I live in Houten… Houten is not a 15-min city like it was talked about during the corona madness.
Houten and many, many other cities and villages in the Netherlands are really small. Not so much people live there.
And the infrastructure has always been very effective in most of the Netherlands.
This has been so for decaded upon decades for many cities in the Netherlands.
They are now setting up in Utrecht and some other towns a digital city, with smart streetpoles everywhere.
Small businesses are going bankrupt in fast rates. How is a carpenter going to fix a house, when the cars are not welcome anymore.
Carry his tools in a wheelbarrow.
?
Also… Many stores in Houten are bankrupt and the center is more and more looking like a ghost town.
The small local shops can’t pay the rent which is very high because of greedy real estate people.
I know you mean well.
But you cannot know the ins and outs when you are not local.
I would love more people to visit Groningen.
Especially the countryside to the south-east and north-west are also lovely.
And the city is the best place the live in my opinion.
Come to Groningen for a weekend mate! Bike around and have a party! 🙃
15 minutes cities are f.cking bad and if you dont see that your screwed.
They want full control of you and it starts with banning the car.
" I swallowed a bumblebee ". Imagine that 😑
Did you know you need a permet to fly a drone above builded areas?
Was hoping for some night shots of the Oude Gracht. Been living in Utrecht for some years now as a student and the Oude Gracht by night/early evening in summer is honestly the most atmospheric and beautiful place in the world if you ask me. I am biased of course.
You've probably/likely already left dutchieland but the Vinex districts are also worthwhile checking out. I'm sorry about the hotel and enjoying every video.
15 minute BULLSH.T we dont fall for that trap made by the elites
Great video Nic, to all people not to familiar with dutch bike roads: Never ever use Google (directions) for planning your route on a bike (and probably other international routers) . It does a very bad job. It obviously takes you where you have to go, but the chosen options are very car oriented, and that is exactly what you do not want, ride along a car road. Looks for the bike signs, the knooppunten, and routers as fietsrouteplanner. Dutch designers divide bikers and cars, don't be stupid to follow the cars tracks.
Not only is the country very flat, it´s also very nicely partitioned off into rectangular parcels of meadow because of water management. It´s quite the sight when seen from above.
So much more you could see… have a look at the LF routes, LF1, 2 and so on. These are the Long Bicycle routes
Damn, where did you try to stay at first? Sounds like a nightmare, can't imagine something like that in the area!
6:37 The actual town of Houten—the clearly defined built-up area of the municipality—comprises maybe only a quarter of the entire area of the municipality of Houten (source: https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houten#/media/Bestand:Gem-Houten-OpenTopo.jpg ) The remaining three quarters is farmland and a few small hamlets. Which means that the geographic entity which one perceives as ‘the town of Houten’, has a much higher average density, probably in the order of 4000 inhabitants. / sq. km.
I mentioned cars being directed onto the ring road of Houten in one of your previous videos. Glad you visited! I love it for its boringness, well stated.
12:55 this beautiful canal was once a beautiful canal… until they turned it into a highway, which they then turned back into a beautiful canal. Which is great!
Great video! Have to note: you have the ''yellow flickering lights in the night'' meaning right, but if this situation occurs you have to follow the traffic lines in who has ''voorrang''. It's not free for all… hope this prevents you a crash or 2 in the night 😉
@11:26 your talking about how flat the land is, but actually, your cycling in a polder! So your really watching the bottom of the see, so land would normally be about 2 people stacked on top above you 😉
About those "wooden posts" at 11:03. Those are only wood on the outside. they are fully effective barriers with a metal core. The wood is just on the outside. They will be just as effective against cars as metal ones. (or at least the ones we have here are metal with a wooden exterior, but I'm assuming these ones are the same since they look identical.)
I'm from Houten but now life in Deflt to study. I will always love Houten.
The Netherlands flat? Try Arnhem, and Posbank. Good luck! 😅
Castellum is a Roman empire founding in Houten and Vleuten/De Meern