Category: The Hague

Dutch Prime Minister, Mayors of Amsterdam, The Hague and Rotterdam: Attention please! (America’s Cup post # 15)

https://happyhotelier.com/wp-content/uploads/Americas-Cup.jpg
The 32nd America’s Cup match has ended in a most spectacular victory for Swiss Team Alinghi. This means that the 33rd America’s Cup Match will be held in a European city somewhere in 2009, 2010 or 2011. Valencia is a likely city of venue again, as it has been a 100% success for both parties.

Here I have some facts for you from the official America’s Cup site:

The 32nd America’s Cup in concept and figures:

Spectator attendance

  • Total visitors (including Marseille, Malmoe, Trapani and Valencia): 6.4 million
  • Port America’s Cup: 5.7 million
  • Season 2007 (Louis Vuitton Act 13, Louis Vuitton Cup and America’s Cup Match): 2.8 million
  • One-day record of visitors to Port America’s Cup: 87.547 (Sunday 1 July 2007)

Internet www.americascup.com

  • Visits: 22 million (total since September 2004)
    2007 season: 16.6 million (since April 1st)
    America’s Cup Match: 3.4 million
  • Page views: 105 million (total since September 2004)
    2007 season: 70 million
    AC Match: 13.4 million
  • One-day records:
    Page views: 2 156 222 (26 June)
    Visits: 518 612 (3 July)
    Unique visitors: 337 894 (3 July)
  • Newsletter Subscribers: 40 000

TV (provisional data)

  • Viewers: over 4 000 million (total since 2004)
    2007 season: over 2 700 million
    Broadcast hours: over 4 500 hours (total since 2004)
    2007 season: over 2 500 hours
  • Networks: over 100
    Rights Holders: 36
  • Countries reached: over 150
  • Production: 400 hours and over 33 cameras

Media

  • Press articles: over 100 000
  • Accreditations: over 6 700 (total since 2004)
    2007 season: 3 200
    America’s Cup Match: 1 460
  • Written press: 371
  • Photographers: 183
  • Radio: 49
  • Internet: 30
  • Television: 227 journalists and producers + 600 technical personnel
  • Countries represented: 40
  • Publications: over 600
  • Press releases issued: 1 040 (in four languages)
  • Press conferences organised: 75

Port America’s Cup

  • 1 million square meter development including the Marinas with nearly 650 berths and 12 team bases
  • Spectator boat service: up to 12 boats every racing day with around 1 300 spectators on board
  • Spectator boats: 2 000 boats on the race course (final weekend 30 June-1 July 2007)
  • Marinas occupation: over 1 000 boats (2007 season)
  • One-day record: 450 boats
  • Total number of nights sold: 25.000

If you are not bidding already to become the city of venue, please prepare a bid to be one of the cities on the way to the match itself.

  • Amsterdam has a marina in IJmuiden with enough space in place.
  • The Hague is contemplating what to do with its abandoned harbor front. This could be an excellent boost for the area.
  • Rotterdam has a proven track record with the 2006 Rotterdam Stopover of the Volvo Ocean Race with an in shore race in the historically important waters of the Battle of Ter Heide.

So, please mr. Dutch Prime Minister and Mayors of Amsterdam, The Hague and Rotterdam: I know none of you have much with sailing, let it be sailing races, but please let the world see the Dutch can rule the waves again! Please take this excellent opportunity to promote one of more of these cities (preferably The Hague of course!). But also please act together and not against each other as you did with the plans for the new Dutch National Historic Museum!

And of course I personally would love to have such a venue in my backyard in The Hague:-)

Added July 20, 2007:
I saw in an article in a local paper that at least one political party in the Board of the The Hague City Counsel has the same idea.

Last edited by Happy Hotelier on February 8, 2010 at 10:58 am [wile waiting for AC33 to start]

The Hague: Summer Solstice Shopping Spree

The Hague has a new initiative: “Winkelnach” which means so much as the title of this post indicates. Tonight, June 21st, most shops in the City Center will stay open until midnight. The idea is that it has to become a same sort of happening as “Koninginnenach”, or Queen’s Night, the night before Queens Day when the Dutch celebrate the Queen’s birthday.

I will keep you posted.

The Hague: shooting of topless video clip not allowed!

I do not particularly like this item. Especially because it enhances the view of foreigners that the Netherlands is full of sex. I don’t like that view. It is not true and there is much more to The Netherlands (or Holland) than over permissiveness. Furthermore I believe the clip is tasteless. So I was hesitant to post it.

However, what happened here has a lot of humor in it.

This is really about going back to the 60ies:

A rather R rated Dutch DJ, Darkraver, is making a video clip in a shiny 60ies Cadillac on the boulevard of Scheveningen (the beach suburb of The Hague):

Besides: recently they dug up a similar car that was buried 50 years ago as a sort of time capsule to find out that it was rusted away almost entirely. So the owner of this Cadillac deserves a compliment.

In the sixties topless sunbathing was definitely not allowed on the Dutch beaches. Nowadays it is. The beach is two steps from the boulevard. The The Hague Police Department arrives with a van full of ME. ME is the special police force to combat riots. So the police definitely shows a lot of overkill. It is not clear whether the DJ got a fine or merely an order to stop. From some reports it appears that the police came because the DJ had not applied for a permission to shoot a clip, suggesting that if he had applied for a license to shoot the clip nothing would have happened.

Is it a set up?

  • The Hague Police Department wanting to advertise they are alert? Every “nomal” Dutchman immediately comments: “Hey cops go catch thieves!”
  • The DJ not applying for a permit to shoot the clip while hoping the police would appear and give him some attention he is in dire need of?
  • The Hague (Police Department) only wanting to give a message that not every nude is permitted?
  • The Hague (Police Department) wanting to give a message that the clip is not to their taste?? HaHa then we get into the freedom of speech discussion.
  • The Hague (Police Department) wanting to give a message the permissiveness of Dutch Society is going back to the years before the 60ies? Basically the same political party is ruling now as was ruling in the 50ies and 60ies.

Yes, I am a Baby Boomer who saw it all happen: The fighting of the youth against the impermissive rulers of the 50ies and the early 60ies.

Latest News, added 16.45 hr: It is a Hoax!
A spokesperson of the The Hague Police Department claims the whole thing is a hoax of Mr R rated DJ: He has taken video footage from the police and copied it into his video. The policeman you see standing next to the car had indeed been standing there, but the ladies were fully dressed. He added that if they would have been topless, they would have forbidden it. So actually they were not that alert and I am a bit sorry I posted this. However I now know how to copy and paste a YouTube clip in a post.

Dutch Eden Hotel Group is expanding rapidly

Bergere Maastricht
Lobby of Design Hotel Bergere in Maastricht

Recently Dutch privately owned Eden Hotel Group (E.H.G.), established in 1977, acquired four hotels:

  • March 5, 2007 the Eden Crown Hotel in Eindhoven, 130 rooms.
  • March 27, 2007 the Sofitel in The Hague which has been renamed into Hotel Eden Babylon, 143 rooms.
  • June 1, 2007 the Holiday Inn in Eindhoven, which will keep its name, 200 rooms.
  • July 1, 2007 Designhotel Bergere in Maastricht with 74 rooms and plans to expand to 109 rooms.

Dutch Design (10): Massive new office for Europol in The Hague

Europol present building
Europol’s present building
Photo Dr Meierhofen (interesting wiki)

Europol calls itself “The European Police Office”. Its is the European Union Law Enforcement Organization that handles criminal intelligence. Its mission is to assist the law enforcement authorities of Member States in their fight against serious forms of organized crime. It has its main office in The Hague in a building that used to be a college campus.

There are plans to move the main office to another location in The Hague,
because of the necessary(?) increase of the number of international employees due to the influx of many new member States into the European Union.

Europol New 1
Marquette of New Europol office,
rendering thanks to the winning
Quist Wintermans Architects

The designated building plot for the new office is close to a residential area with a great monumental value.

Doesn’t look too bad. However, if I’m well informed that for security reasons the current plan is the same building, but 90 degrees rotated left which is far worse compared to this situating, because the residents in this Marquette situated in the lower left corner will only see the blind walls of the left building and of the highest building (The architect’s rendering cleverly don’t show the blind walls.)

Today the Municipal Committee that monitors the design of new buildings (and their impact in monumentally valuable environments) will have a public hearing, while about 300 near by residents have lodged protests against the building plans the massiveness of the buildings itself and the necessity of taking a lot of space for security measures. Just because of the heavy post 9/11 security measures around the USA Embassy, The Hague and the US ambassador recently agreed to move the Embassy outside the city center. This on its turn caused protests of the residents around the building plot for the new Embassy. Civil servants jargon for such protest is NIMBY: “No In My Back Yard!”

Europol New 2
Massive New Europol office,
Rendering thanks to the winning
Quist Wintermans Architects

Even the former state architect and a couple of influential Dutch architects have written an open letter to the The Hague Municipal authorities to urge them not to take this spot, or at least not to build the building that is anticipated.

Europol New 3
Another angle that the residents will not see!
Rendering thanks to the winning
Quist Wintermans Architects

At first glance Europol’s site doesn’t divulge a word about this plans except for this ancient press release. Probably, because they lack some corporate governance officers: See their job opportunities. Come on ladies and gentlemen, the salaries are -as usual with inter governmental organizations- on a very low tax base…. I find it strange, as in the past (well already about 20 years ago now) another intergovernmental organization, the European Patent Office with main seat in Munich, Germany and second important office in Rijswijk, a suburb of The Hague, attracted a lot of publicity with new building plans that eventually didn’t com through, because the number of European patent application all of a sudden decreased enormously.

Well we will see what the wise man will decide. Maybe they will rotate it back 90 degrees 🙂 “And they took a sip from their glass and left it as it was”