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Nov. 13th, 2020 05:22 pmThis is the development we live in. It's called Molenwijk, Mill District, and the buildings are laid out to call to mind classic four-sailed windmills. The buildings are individually named things like tower mill (torenmolen) and bergmolen (mountain mill). We live in Petmolen, which I'm not sure I'm getting the correct translatin for. (Pet mill?) They are ten floor residential highrises with car parks in the middle, and we are on the third floor. Access to the front door is via a shared exterior walkway that runs the length of the building, and we have a back balcony exclusive to our unit.
This is quite atypical urban planning for Amsterdam, but it was built in the 1960s and is much (much!) newer than the old city south of the IJ. If I figured out the translated history correctly, the land we are on was water until the 1870s when it was drained and became a polder. Officially we are in Amsterdam, but it is Amsterdam Noord, across the IJ from the center of old Amsterdam.
The squarish building in the southeast is a shopping center with a grocery store (Albert Heijn), doctors offices, a post office, and other handy things. Even high-rise residential is fairly walkable here! Also, the entire interior of the Molenwijk area, other than the stub roads that to to the car parks, is restricted to pedestrian and bicycle traffic. There are frequently people with dogs visible outside our windows. This being the Netherlands, they are usually off leash. This morning, there were two cute chubby birds sitting in the tree just past our balcony. I really like the place so far.
There's a lot of cleaning left to do at the old place. I'm going to end up taking a few trips to take care of everything there, and will likely buy a bike trailer to take any remaining bits and bobs over here and because I want one anyway for grocery shopping.
This is quite atypical urban planning for Amsterdam, but it was built in the 1960s and is much (much!) newer than the old city south of the IJ. If I figured out the translated history correctly, the land we are on was water until the 1870s when it was drained and became a polder. Officially we are in Amsterdam, but it is Amsterdam Noord, across the IJ from the center of old Amsterdam.
The squarish building in the southeast is a shopping center with a grocery store (Albert Heijn), doctors offices, a post office, and other handy things. Even high-rise residential is fairly walkable here! Also, the entire interior of the Molenwijk area, other than the stub roads that to to the car parks, is restricted to pedestrian and bicycle traffic. There are frequently people with dogs visible outside our windows. This being the Netherlands, they are usually off leash. This morning, there were two cute chubby birds sitting in the tree just past our balcony. I really like the place so far.
There's a lot of cleaning left to do at the old place. I'm going to end up taking a few trips to take care of everything there, and will likely buy a bike trailer to take any remaining bits and bobs over here and because I want one anyway for grocery shopping.
