Open to (nearly) all

There are few more disappointing arrivals to a great city than emerging from Amsterdam’s Central Station. It’s a beautiful 19th-century cast-iron and red-brick building designed by Rijksmuseum architect Pierre Cuypers. But a few steps from its monumental entrance hall, you are greeted by a tangle of tram tracks, unsteady tourists wobbling on rental bikes and the heavy whiff of marijuana. Then the main stretch down to Dam Square is a gauntlet of low-grade pancake houses, garish coffee shops (as legal cannabis cafés are known) and crowds of visitors…