Utrecht, Netherlands

Utrecht, capital of the province of that name and the fourth largest city in the Netherlands, lies at the northeast corner of "Randstad Holland" on the Kromme Rijn, which here divides into the Oude Rijn and the Vecht, and on the Amsterdam-Rhine Canal, exactly on the geographical divide between the fenlands to the west and the sandy heathlands to the east. This position on the natural dividing line between the two territories favored the development of the town over the centuries, since the heathlands, lying higher, were out of reach of the storm tides of the North Sea and offered ideal conditions for human settlement before the dyking of the fenlands.
From very early times Utrecht was one of the principal political, economic and cultural centers of the Netherlands. The seat of the provincial administration, with a famous university founded in 1636, it is also an important religious center, the see of a Roman Catholic and an Old Catholic archbishop and the seat of the Oecumenical Council, the supreme Roman Catholic authority of the Netherlands. The existence of the University has led to the establishment in Utrecht of other educational and research institutions, including branches of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Science, the Central Institute for Nutritional Research, space research laboratories and the Institute of International Law, to mention only the most important.
But Utrecht is not only an educational, research and ecclesiastical center; it is also of importance in the services sector, commerce, transport and industry. Industry is concentrated primarily on the west side of the city, where railroad lines, roads and canals converge. The most important industrial installations are steelworks and rolling mills, engineering and rolling-stock plants, factories producing electrical apparatus and appliances, petrochemicals and textiles, railroad workshops and furniture factories.

Utrecht Attractions

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