Due to the closure of cannabis coffee shops close to the Dutch border with Belgium border, fewer tourists are visiting the Netherlands specifically to buy the drug.
Dutch daily AD reports that the towns of Terneuzen, Bergen op Zoom and Roosendaal are experiencing less nuisance from the influx of “drugs tourists”. However, Belgian towns have seen a corresponding increase in drug trafficking and home cultivation because users have stopped crossing the border into the Netherlands to make their purchases.
"The nuisance caused by drug users has disappeared now Checkpoint, the biggest coffee shop in Europe, has been closed down," says Daniël Rouw, a spokesman for Terneuzen town council.
The coffee shops have been closed in response to frustration in the Dutch border towns caused by parking difficulties, traffic problems, public urination and littering, blamed on foreign visitors. While cannabis is not legal in the Netherlands, the sale of the drug to the public in licensed coffee shops is tolerated.
Signposting in Terneuzen - ANP
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I`m glad they set a limit to that. I`m afraid things began to look a little out of control lately. There`s one thing to attend a party and to experience some touristic attractions of the place, like legal buds or similar legal stuff, and there`s completely another thing to travel across boundaries just for buying things your own country wouldn`t allow you. This isn`t tourism anymore.
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