The Netherlands Is INSANELY Well-Designed | American Reaction

Thank you so much for watching! The Netherlands seems really incredible. :) Thanks to Factor75 for sponsoring today's video. Go to strms.net/factor75_hailheidi and get 50% OFF your first Factor75 box + Free Wellness Shots for Life! Two free wellness shots per order with an active subscription.

People who only want cars do not want easy, safe and affordable transportation for everyone. Children in the USA are dependent on their parent for transportation until they got their driver's licence. In the Netherlands they cycle there themselves. THAT IS FREEDOM.

It is true that the USA is less densely populated, but more then 90% of bike trips in the Netherlands are trips within a city. So that is viable all over the world

tbf this guy is somewhat wrong about why the size of houses are smaller. I'm a planning student in the Netherlands and some suburbs where the houses are a lot bigger (and more expensive), still have great cycling infrastructure. We do not build smaller homes because of bicycle infrastructure or shops for that matter no, (although we do aim for 10 minute to 15 minute cities). The reason why we have smaller homes is because the land you purchase is simply much more expensive because it's so densely populated. Lots of people can't even buy houses here (40% rent) and rent is very expensive outside the social housing system (about 40% of all rented homes in the Netherlands are social). So it's natural for us to build smaller, more densely populated housing projects so everyone can actually live somewhere. But there are lots of places where houses are bigger (in cities) with great cycling infrastructure, but if you want a house as big as in Florida, you need a lot more money than in Florida unfortunately. It's basically for the super rich, especially in cities. In the Netherlands more densely populated = more expensive.

You dont really lose space in a walkable area, you lose space that's 100% your but you gain parks, cafes etc and you still have some space thats yours. You dont need a home library or home cinema when you just have a library or cinema.

It's funny how Americans always think we cycle just because our country is flat and dense populated. But New York (yes, just the city) is half the size of The Netherlands. It's dense populated and flat as well. Yet you Americans rather sit on a comfy chair waiting for the light to become green than getting to work faster by cycling. I life in the south west province Zeeland (Sealand) where the Delta Works are and this is absolutely not dense populated. As a kid I went to school 5 towns away and had to cycle 45min single trip everyday.

Amsterdam Schiphol Airport has 1 runway called Polderbaan which is 3.1 miles from the terminal building. It’s a 10-15 minute taxi to the runway. The last time I flew out of Amsterdam, I took off from Polderbaan and I saw a farmer tending to his crops close to the runway. Also in the Netherlands they have wildlife bridges. They are these super cool bridges that go over roads so animals can cross safely. You should look them up. They are very cool and very considerate to the needs of our animal friends.

There's one thing that is rarely mentioned in all these videos about The Netherlands. And that is our roads. We not only bike a lot but we drive a lot too. Did you know that the vast majority of our asphalt roads are paved with open asphalt? It drains rainwater away immediately so even when it rains heavily there's hardly any spray so visibility is a lot better even in bad weather. We're so used to it by now we just forget. And it's not just the highways, main roads in a lot of the towns and villages are paved with open asphalt as well. I think driving here is really different compared to the US. Shorter distances, the design of the infrastructure plus the amount of and variation in traffic participants demand that you're super alert all the time.

Schiphol airport was once a treacherous piece of water that often wracked ships. The 'shiphol' consists of 'schip' (ship) and 'hol' (hole) as it was a (hell) hole or a grave for ships.

I moved to Holland full time after working here for 9 months a year over 4 years. Now 10 years on from that move I see my working life ending here aswell.

Great reaction vid :) Fun fact about the largest bike parking garage in Utrecht. The bike parking is on one end of the train station, there is another one at the other end, having a capacity of around 4500 bikes. Not nearly as big, but still really big. And the next two garages are not far away either. All those parking facilities have cctv and permanent watch, and they are all free for 24 hours. I live in the outskirts of Utrecht. If I go by car, it takes me 25 minutes to get to the parking garage, which costs around 10 euros per hour (!) to park there. Cycling takes 20 minutes (which is less) and parking is free. This really encourages people to go to the city center by bike instead of the car. Imagine 20 million cars in such a small country, it would be permanent congestion everywhere.

The size of a country argument is completely irrelevant to be honest. We dont cycle from one side of the country all the way to the other side, we use it to get to school, work, to do shopping, go out with friends etc, all things that - a lot of the time - you can do within a reasonable distance of your home. It all depends on how your cities are designed. For the Netherlands bike paths are given as much a direct route as possible, while cars are made to drive the long way around. In contrast in the US, even if you need to go get something trivial like a bottle of milk from the nearest convenience store, you're already forced to go by car because thats the only option the civil engineers and urban planners have given you.

A levee is another word for Dyke or stop bank, seperating land from water. A dam, in this context, seperates water from water and often have locks that can control flow and waterlevels

I live in Groningen, located in the north of the Netherlands and 6th biggest city in the country. The city where they tested rain sensors on traffic lights, so when it rains cyclist get a green light more often and people sitting nice and dry in their cars have to wait a bit longer. And the only city in the Netherlands where at many traffic lights give a green light to all cyclists from all directions whithout causing a lot of accidents. Unlike some other city's where they tried this. Want to know more? Streetfilms made a great video about Groningen: https://youtu.be/fv38J7SKH_g?si=vI7pC89nJoxLsLOc

I'm curious, greetings from the Netherlands, founder of New Amsterdam (New York) ❤

By the way, our King is visiting Atlanta at this moment and later this week New York.

In the 70's, as mentioned briefly, there was an uprising,a national protest with the slogan 'stop child murder!' Referring to the many road deaths that predominantly took children. That eventually swivelled the political environment to the bike-centered planning we have today. It did not come easily. About if other Americans want it also. Remind them that if you focus your planning on pedestrians and cyclists, the car drivers are equal winners. They could drive their cars just to the outskirts of the cities and take public transportation or a bike. But even if they still prefer to only drive their car the roads would have a lot less trafic and driving will become more pleasant. The only thing they need to give up that will really hurt is 'right on red' which is a lare killer of cyclists and pedestrians.

I'm sure it wasn't politicians listening that changed things, it was activists who became political and even became politicians themselves that created the conditions for change. Nearly every benefit in working and living conditions that 'the people' gain is hard fought for over decades and even centuries. There is hardly ever a kindly benevolent government that does this without being elected with that in mind.

I'm old enough to have know the Netherlands when it didn't have all the brilliant bike and public transport stuff, and believe me, the Dutch took about 50 years to get things sort of right. There was a lot of trial and error over the years. The main problem is that other countries (does't matter which one) never believe that what works once can work again. They all want to invent their own wheel, over and over again, and then they get discouraged and give up.

There is one city on the right track in the USA. Search for Carmel Indiana.