Rotterdam growing despite people leaving Dutch cities for countryside

An increasing number of Dutch people are leaving the big cities to live in the Netherlands' country side. Rotterdam is the only one of the large Dutch cities to see an increase in population due to Dutch people moving there last year, according to figures released by Statistics Netherlands on Monday. Last year more people moved between municipalities than the year before. The difference with the previous two years was biggest in Amsterdam. Last year more than 39 thousand people moved from Amsterdam to live elsewhere in the Netherlands. That is 4 thousand more than in 2014 and almost 10 thousand more than in 2013. The number of people who moved to Amsterdam from other municipalities also increased, but less sharply. For the first time since the beginning of the financial crisis in 2008, more people moved out of Amsterdam than moved in. In the period 2000 to 2008 this was the case every year. More people move out of The Hague than into the city nearly every year, even during the crisis. Since 2013 the number of people leaving the city increased significantly. Last year the city's population shrunk by nearly 1,700 due to people moving to other municipalities. More people usually move to Utrecht than move away from the city. But in 2015 the population growth due to Dutch moving in was much lower than in previous years, according to Statistics Netherlands. Rotterdam is the only one of the four large cities in the Netherlands in which the number of people moving to the city increased more last year than the number of people moving out. One balance the city's population grew by 1,500 people due to Dutch moving there. Between 2008 and 2013 the number of Dutch people moving into or out of Rotterdam was about equal.