The search for a caravan location has now been a process that has taken years. According to EU law, municipalities are obliged to maintain the caravan culture and meet the need for pitches. In Enschede there is also a need for about 20 to 25 additional locations. The municipality has always maintained that there was no money to make that possible. That reading is highly doubtful, now that the municipality is using millions of unused subsidy money – which was on the shelf for eight years – for the construction of social housing. According to the rules, the money could also have been used for caravans.
Choice of 20 locations
In any case, the target group has been calling for additional pitches for years. At the existing caravan locations on Robinson Crusoëstraat and Sleutelkamp there is no space or vacant places are only provided to people with family ties. Traveler residents (without a car) Herman Hendriks and Johan Pril from Enschede were so fed up with the lack of perspective that they took action a few years ago.
Hendriks even ‘claimed’ a position at the Broekheurne-Ring in protest. Following the protest, the municipal council urged the council to conduct a study into a suitable caravan location. In the meantime, the government made a subsidy of 455,000 euros available to make construction possible.
Ultimately, a majority of the municipal council selected a plot on the corner of Windmolenweg/Twekkelerbeekweg from twenty possible locations. The plot of land was once purchased by the municipality as a ‘strategic stock’ for a possible expansion of the De Marssteden business park.
Special housing type
Good news, of course, for potential residents such as Pril and Hendriks, who have been waiting for years for a suitable place for their own caravan. But there is criticism of the municipality from the interest group Vereniging Behoud Twekkelo. Former chairman Bart Overbeek previously explained to 1Twente that the hamlet has been shrinking for decades due to urban developments. According to the VBT, the construction of caravans does not fit in with their neighborhood.
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Last week, councilor Jeroen Diepemaat reiterated the council’s position in the committee meeting of the West district that zoning plans actually provide space for caravans in the countryside. “The urban fringe zone offers space for special types of housing,” says Diepemaat. And this includes knarrenhofjes (senior homes), tiny houses, but according to the alderman also caravans.
Subsidy expires
There are even more concerns in the area. The adjacent earthworks and recycling company Wesseler-Oude Booyink fears that expansion plans cannot go ahead if caravans are built, due to odor and noise nuisance circles. The council believes that this is not the case and that there are homes closer to the company than the proposed caravans. According to the company, individual agreements have been made with these other residents.
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Current VBT chairman Gijs Oosterhuis says he is afraid that the other fifteen stands that Enschede wants to make possible will also be developed on the Twekkelerbeekweg for cost reasons. Although much financial information is secret, the hamlet also believes that it will not stop at exceeding more than 4 tons. The government subsidy will expire on December 1 if no development takes place. Formally, the municipality would then have to refund the amount.
‘No expansion’
According to councilor Jeroen Diepemaat, there is no reason to place more caravans on the Twekkelerbeekweg in the future. “If we are going to do more, we will not make any proposals for this location,” Diepemaat said. “At this location, this council can guarantee that there will be ten.”
To add that a future council may have a different opinion, but that a new change to the zoning plan will be required. The councilor says he is not concerned about the expiring subsidy. “The purpose of the subsidy is to realize this, so the government does not have much interest in reclaiming it when we get started.”
Cold relationship
In the meantime, the relationship between the municipality of Enschede and the hamlet of Twekkelo has seriously cooled. This seems to be confirmed once again in the council proposal. “Now that the municipality cannot meet the demands of VBT (and others) in the form they envision, they have the impression that the municipality does not listen to their concerns at all,” the council said. ‘We think it’s a shame that that impression has arisen.’
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The Twekkelo Conservation Association would have liked to take over ownership of the remaining part of the caravan plot. This could in principle prevent an expansion in the future. The Municipal Executive did not want to cooperate in this. According to the council, the fact that the zoning plan would have to be changed again for an expansion provides sufficient guarantee.
The district committee has few doubts about the proposal. The proposal has therefore been registered as a hammer item for next Monday and will therefore in principle no longer be discussed. It is obvious that Twekkelo will appeal to the Council of State. Only once this procedure has been completed can the land be sold to housing association De Woonplaats, which is responsible for the construction and rental of the caravans.