The city of Amsterdam is looking to get rid of its iconic tourist attraction, the massive letters spelling “I amsterdam” in front of the Rijksmuseum. Could they be coming to Groningen or Friesland?
Annalies Usmany, an alderperson for the city of Appingedam in Groningen, told RTV Noord that the municipality will be happy to take the letters off their hands. The Groningen town with 11,000 inhabitants can rearrange the letters to spell out “I am damster” instead.
Usmany says, “The letters are just right for us and we can give them an environmentally friendly second shot at life. With the slogan ‘I am damster’, our municipality can make sure that visitors feel welcome here.” The city is also actively campaigning to serve as an alternative tourist destination to Amsterdam.
Amsterdam Lake District
When the news came out last week that the municipality was considering removing the letters, which have become a symbol of Amsterdam’s explosive tourism industry and GroenLinks argue promotes individualism, Lysanne Kuindersma from Joure also jumped at the chance. She runs the Amsterdam Lake District tour, which is actually a bus tour of Friesland and other provinces around the IJsselmeer. Kuindersma told the Leeuwarder Courant that her family-owned company could just add the words “lake” and “district” to promote their cheekily named tour.
The letters at the Rijksmuseum are not the only version of the sign in Amsterdam: tourists also climb the red and white words outside of Schiphol airport and at the Sloterpas lake. Two other versions of the sign are used for promotional events.
The letters, which are part of the Amsterdam marketing department, were developed by advertising agency KesselsKramer. They are more ten two meters tall and 23.5 meters wide, and have been located on the Museumplein since 2004.
Photo source: Google Maps
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