Amsterdam Centraal

This guide to Amsterdam Centraal follows a fight between the national government in The Hague, which decided in the 1880s to build a grand station on the open water of the IJ harbour, and Amsterdam's own civic voices, who called it an attack on the city's beauty. It follows architect Pierre Cuypers, who had already given the city its Rijksmuseum, and the engineering problem he faced: no solid ground to build on. Workers dredged sand from the North Sea Canal to raise three artificial islands before a single pile was driven.