The 17th century Canal Belt was placed on UNESCO's World Heritage list in 2011 and the medieval center of the city (The Red light district) is undergoing an extensive renovation with Project 1012. That name refers to the postal area code of that section of the city. That project aims to reduce prostitution in the area with at least 30 percent and to highlight the historical aspects of the oldest section of Amsterdam.

Wooden footwear go as far back a minimum of 800 years based on data available at the moment. Fortunately old illustrations and works of art have given some evidence, as excavated samples are rare. Most worn-out wooden footwear wound up as fire wood, making the finds in Amsterdam and Rotterdam of greater value. The good examples found date correspondingly from around 1230 and 1280.

While the original meaning and purpose of the signs are open to interpretation, this has not affected their popularity over the centuries. The signs have become so popular that they are now a major tourist attraction in Pennsylvania. Very few decorative items hold such significant meaning with so much cultural heritage, so their value is still very much on the rise as time passes.

Changes continue: since 2007, city officials have taken measures to clean up the district by reducing the number of red-light windows in an effort to eliminate pimps, human traffickers and money launderers (all of which are illegal). Project 1012, named for the area's postal code, encourages fashion studios, art galleries, cafes and other creative enterprises to set up here. In 2013, the council raised the minimum age for prostitutes from 18 to 21 and introduced mandatory red-light window closing hours between 6am and 8am.

A typical Amsterdam street scene sees countless cyclists either heading to or from work, transporting young children to school, or carrying anything from groceries or house pets to impressively tricky objects like big suitcases, ladders or even bulky furniture. From students to police officers and from bank staff to couriers, everybody’s on a bike – cycling is the most egalitarian mode of transport in Amsterdam.

Carré theatre, is an Old Dutch design wooden bridge known as a double-swipe (balanced) bridge. Tradition relates that the bridge was named after the sisters Mager, who were supposed to live on opposite sides of the river. They are said to have had the wooden bridge built to make it easier to visit one another. However it appears more likely, that the original bridge acquired the name from being so narrow (mager means skinny in Dutch), that it was hard for two pedestrians to pass one along anoth