It was by no means a pleasant letter that local residents of the Lutkemeerpolder in Nieuw-West received on Friday. It could be read that from today preparations would start to build on the ground of the polder, something that local residents have been fighting against for years. They are taking action today.
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Local residents have been fighting since 2017, led by Alies Fernhout, already for the preservation of the Lutkemeerpolder, a nature reserve in New West with the last piece of historic agricultural land in Amsterdam. There is also De Boterbloem, the care farm run by Fernhout that is in danger of disappearing due to the building plans.
Brief
Despite their years of struggle, the Behoud Lutkemeer action group is still not very listening. The letter that local residents received on Friday showed this again, according to the action group. ‘It seems that today the contractor actually wants to start with the preparations for the construction of the first part of the business park in the Lutkemeerpolder. We will pull out all the stops to prevent this and hope that everyone will come and help us, ‘says Behoud Lutkemeer.
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The action group immediately adds a call: ‘Come to the corner Etnastraat / Lutkemeerweg on Monday morning at 6.30 am to join the protest! Bring a mouth mask, games, sheets, paint and cardboard protest signs; we provide coffee, tea and cake. ‘
Today, the municipal developer GEM Lutkemeer wants to start with the so-called pre-tax before actually building, says the letter to local residents. ‘This means that we apply soil to the places where roads and buildings will be built later. We do this to prevent buildings and roads from subsiding later. We use land from our own area for this. We therefore excavated approximately 12 meters of ditch at the dike on the west side of Business Amsterdam Osdorp. We use part of this land for preloading. ‘
Noise at the Stopera
The activists want to stop this preloading by blocking them. They know all too well that a protest action is not without risk. An earlier protest action in September last year resulted in six activists being arrested.
It remains alone at the blockade. Local residents will make themselves heard again tonight at 7.30 pm. Then they start making noise in front of the Stopera when there is a council meeting there. The action group asks local residents to bring megaphones and vuvuzelas, among other things.
Forwoman
The leader of the action group, Alies Fernhout, was one of the ten nominees in the race to become Amsterdammer of the year at the beginning of this year. She finished second, behind singer Merel Huizinga. Watch the short report below AT5 at the time made with Fernhout about her struggle to preserve the Lutkemeerpolder:
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