Haarlemmerdijk is the heart of the neighborhood of Haarlemmerbuurt. It stretches a mere 3 blocks- from Haarlemmerplein to where it crosses a canal and becomes Haarlemmerstraat- which continues on toward Central Station and the Red Light district beyond (of particular note, there is a very apparent change in the atmosphere when you cross the canal and make the switch to Haarlemmerstraat- more on this in a later post).
The 3 blocks of Haarlemmerdijk epitomizes the diverse urban scale of Amsterdam- practically any kind of shop or retail business that one can think of is located here. There are restaurants and cafes, bars, coffeeshops (both kinds), clothing boutiques, shoe stores, grocery stores and markets, bakery, a chocolatier, cheese shops, butcher (chicken), butcher (beef and pork), butcher (halal), banks, shoe repair, a key shop, cooking stores, a cookbook store, pharmacy, drug stores, book stores, a movie theater, tea shops, bulk coffee shop, liquor/wine/beer shops, convenience stores, a hotel, household items stores, postal services, office supply store, a laundromat, art galleries, have I left anything out? Oh yeah- typically these businesses are all on the ground level. The 2 to 4 levels above are primarily residential.
Walking down Haarlemmerdijk, one can begin to comprehend the diversity and density of the neighborhood of Haarlemmerbuurt and the 10,000 Amsterdamers that the Haarlemmerdijk serves.
- The neighborhood of Haarlemmerbuurt has an area of 0.208 square miles with a population of 9,260, which represents a density of 44,520 inhabitants per square mile. Haarlemmerdijk is highlighted in Red
- The red dot is our apartment. The shaded circle represents a radius of approximately 800 feet which takes in the entire 3 blocks of Haarlemmerdijk.
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