Alderman: Ban tourist buses from Amsterdam

Pieter Litjens, the Amsterdam alderman of Traffic, is considering banning pollutant tourist buses from the capital. He is looking at possibilities to move the buses to the edge of the city, he said in the AT5 political program Park Politiek. This means that additional locations will have to be created for the tourist buses. According to Litjens, they are looking at the possibility of creating coach parking at Holendrecht or Duivendrecht and at the Ruyterkade, on the east side of the Central Station. "What we do not want is for coaches to come to Amsterdam to load their people off the bus and then staying on the stops." he said. Litjens also stated that there are concrete plans to establish an environmental zone for tour buses. When the environmental zone will be put in place will become more clear in the coming months. Litjens expects that the environmental zone will drastically decrease the number of buses in the city in the future. "In ten years I expect that a lot of tour buses will stop at the edge of the city and that the people then will use other forms of transport to travel to the city center."