A little walking path through the greenery, with some grass on either side; after walking a few meters through the new housing development on the outskirts of Driebergen, you already feel like you’re in the woods. Just one more turn to the right, and then—suddenly, there’s a large metal fence. Behind that gate lie more trees and the local farm where you can buy eggs. But that’s no longer an option from this side; the path has been closed off for a few weeks now, and no one can get through anymore.
Ulrike Nagel filmed and edited this segment for RTV Utrecht.
“I always walk here with my little boy; he gets to put the money for the eggs in the farmer’s tray,” says a mother. In the stroller in front of her sits a blond little boy with his Dikkie Dik stuffed animal. “He’s only two, so now we have to take a detour of almost two kilometers with the stroller—we can manage it, but it’s not exactly fun.”
She’s not the only one standing at the gate today. Nearly 50 local residents have gathered, each with their own disappointment. The runner, who always does his lap here and wants to continue on to the Klompenpad further down the road. “We athletes are, of course, very fit, but a small section—less than 50 meters—is now closed off, and we have to take such a big detour just to get around it—that’s just incomprehensible.”
Disbelief and incomprehension—that’s the prevailing sentiment among all the local residents here. Marcel van den Elst is one of the people who’ve been focused on nothing else these past few weeks. “The path simply has to be reopened. People have been walking through here for 150 years; for a long time there was a sign that said ‘Private Road,’ but local residents were still allowed to pass. In fact, until 2005 there wasn’t even a fence around the estate, and you could walk through the large garden there as well. It’s 18 hectares in size, and I fully understand that the owner wants his garden to be private, but the fact that the path now has to be closed as well—nobody understands that. What interest does Mr. Willems have in this? We don’t understand that.”
Mr. Willems—that is, Maik Willems—is the owner of the Bastion Hotels chain and, as such, also the owner and resident of the estate. Together with a farmer further down the road, he sent a letter to the residents. He’s also willing to explain over the phone. “It’s gotten pretty busy here lately, and unpleasant things are happening, especially at night. It’s a wooded path; drugs are being dealt, things are being stolen, and young people throw their stuff over our fence when the police are after them. Molotov cocktails are being thrown, and some people think this is their territory. If you say anything about it, you get a rude response. It used to be a quiet path, but it just isn’t as pleasant anymore. More construction will be taking place around it soon, so it’ll get even busier. And we’d really like to preserve the estate’s unique layout and the natural surroundings.” According to Willems, they’ve called the police several times, but the police can’t always be stationed there. We checked with the Midden-Nederland Police Department. They indicated that there have been two incidents in recent weeks—one involving a scooter and one involving a stolen dirt bike. According to the police, there hasn’t been much more in the way of disturbances here.
Marcel van den Elst: “There are so many local residents here who walk their dogs in the evening, and nothing ever happens here. Yes, occasionally, like everywhere else, but that’s really nothing to worry about. Besides, Mr. Willems also talks about nature conservation, but he himself regularly races in the Dakar Rally, so yeah, a lot of people can’t take that seriously.” Cees Sprenger, a board member of the Tuinwijk Sterrebosch neighborhood association, agrees that little happens here. Nearly 1,200 people have now signed the neighborhood association’s petition to have the path reopened. “We also take neighborhood safety very seriously. If there were a problem here, we would have been sitting down with the police a long time ago.””Just putting up a fence out of the blue is simply a strange choice,” says someone from the group. “It’s just like shoplifting. We could decide to close the stores to prevent shoplifting. But that’s an absurd solution!” Meanwhile, according to some, safety is now at risk as well; there have already been two accidents involving local residents who had to detour around the fence, including an elderly man who was hit by a tractor and ended up in the hospital with multiple broken bones.
Suddenly, a song plays from a cell phone: “And the birds fly from west to east past the fence. They aren’t whistled back, nor are they shot down, over the wall, over this iron barrier, because sometimes they want to be in the east and sometimes in the west. Because the need lies in moving and being connected together.’ The resident who adapted the song by Klein Orkest has difficulty walking himself and is also fed up with the closure. “Comparing it to the Berlin Wall is a bit of a stretch, but it is a small restriction on freedom. Like for me and for small children—it’s getting difficult for them. They can no longer go directly out into nature, which is essential in this society.”
The municipality has also become involved in the matter. If it were up to the local residents, it would simply have to be reopened as soon as possible. Whether that’s allowed could very well turn into a legal battle. Marcel van den Elst: “If that happens, Willems’ pockets are, of course, bottomless. So that’s a tough position to defend. We’re trying to gather arguments to provide the municipality with evidence that this should have been a public path and that the municipality may have dropped the ball in the past. So we’re also going through the historical archives; we have maps dating back to 1868—all sorts of things that could be used as evidence, and we’re currently looking into that.” The municipality has stated that it is investigating whether the closure of the walking trail is lawful. “The legal question that needs to be answered is whether the Engweg is a public road within the meaning of the Roads Act. If this is the case, the municipality will take enforcement action against the installation of the fencing.” Maik Willems believes the municipality has no business getting involved, as the path is on private property. Hikers have always been tolerated, but now that’s enough: “I can well imagine that well-meaning people find that unfair, but unfortunately, it’s sometimes the case that the good must suffer because of the bad. We want the nuisance to stop. As far as we’re concerned, the closure of the path is permanent.”
On the other side of the fence, a local resident notes that it’s particularly strange that no consultation ever took place. “It’s like two goats trying to cross a log over the water from opposite sides. They collide in the middle and both fall into the water. Sheep do it differently—one sheep bends down so the other can walk over it, and that way they both make it to the other side. That’s how it should work here, too.”
