The princesses have written a letter to the local council who have to permit the trees being cut down to support the inhabitants who oppose culling the threes. As far as i remember it's the first time that a member of the Royal House (princess Margriet) signs a letter like that and gets involved in local politics.
I've never been comfortable with the sale of the palace to the nation in the 1970's and even less with the choice of TM not to use the palace. Even the Spanish monarchy supposedly one of the cheaper monarchies in Europe has the use of multiple palaces. So living at Huis ten Bosch and working at Noordeinde and the Royal Palace in Amsterdam only occasionally in use by the Royals and usually open to the public a third country residence in the shape of Soestdijk would have been great. Yes it would have costed millions to restore but we Dutch need to be less stingy when it comes to maintaining our national heritage.
Since buying the palace in the early 70's no major work has been done to the palace by the State. That is simply bad ownership.
Yes the king rents castle het oude Loo but that is not very large.
If he had had Soestdijk as his official summer residence in the country the palace could have been restored and remain in use. It's not very large but has strong emotional links for the older generations and being well located in the centre of the country and fairly close to Amsterdam and Schiphol it could also have functioned as a place to put guests up who due to security issues cannot be given the guest suites of the Royal Palace.
Btw the princesses have a strong argument. In a time where we have to look at how to replant forests it is inappropriate to cut down ancient woods.
When the -horribly neglected - Palace Soestdijk finally got a new owner and thus plans were made for a new destination most people were relieved.
However, the new plans also include some appartement building, further away from the Palace itself, as well as some of the former buildings that were used for the Royal Guards (across the road of the Palace) will also undergo a transformation.
After all, restoring the Palace itself is a very costly affair so the money has to come from somehwere. Since the Palace is surrounded by woods and is a very large estate one would have hoped that things would turn out for the best.
However, a few days ago, Princess Irene and her youngser sister Princess Margriet made it known they don't agree with the plans to use parts of woods behind the Palace to build some appartments there.
Personally I find it very strange that the sisters didn't raise their voices earlier on plus there's the fact that they might even have bought that particular piece of woodland for nature conservation if they are so desperate to safe that bit of wood.
However, the Palace has been totally neglected by the RF and all they did was remove all furniture after the deaths of Princess Juliana and Prince Bernhard in 2004.
May be considering buying a bit of land might have been a good idea at that time and would even have provided money for the restoration of the Palace for the new owners !
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