This summer it seemed that Ans Kikkert had to find another place for her ice cream truck, but it has now been announced that she can remain at her permanent place in Den Hoorn. The Board of Mayor and Aldermen has again looked at the objections, declared them unfounded again and better substantiated Ans’s permit.
That leaves the municipality of Texel know. Ans Kikkert has been selling her ice creams for fifteen years with her ice cream truck IJs van Ans on the corner of Jan Ayeslag and Rommelpot in Den Hoorn. When local residents complained to the municipality, the latter asked Ans if she wanted to apply for a permit. She did and then she got it.
But the local residents did not leave it at that and stepped – despite an online petition which was set up with now over 4,000 signatures – to court. The judge went along with their objections, and ruled, among other things, that the ice cream truck was a catering company. Texel therefore had to reconsider the objections and the granted permit.
Adjustments
That has now happened and the municipality of Texel has made some adjustments, so that it can remain. For example, ‘a stand for ice cream sales’ was previously included in the amended rules. But it had not yet been officially adopted by the college. Now it is.
The municipality also states that the seats (tree trunks with rugs) were seen as part of a catering company. By no longer actively decorating the tree stumps, the ice cream truck can no longer be seen as a catering company, the municipality says.
Unsafe
The traffic situation at the ice cream truck is also said to be unsafe. Texel says it has now officially investigated this. ‘Based on the results of this, the Municipal Executive judges that there is no question of an unsafe (traffic) situation,’ according to the municipality of Texel.
Direct stakeholders such as Ans and local residents have been informed.
Ans previously told NH Nieuws that she did not understand why she had to leave the place where she had been selling ice cream for years. “That family says they are inconvenienced by my customers, but they live 30 meters away. They were just looking for something to get me away.”
The local residents in turn indicated, after they had been proved right by the judge, that there were ‘only losers’. “It would not have had to come to this if the municipality had taken our complaints seriously and had wanted to discuss it. Ans did not want that either. We were right, but the whole process was wrong.”