In Krommenie, residents of De Grote Beer are speculating heavily about the perpetrator(s) and motives of the burnt-down car. For example, residents of the flat blame the loitering youth, but others think of envy: “Nice car, double parked. Maybe jealousy?” Last night they were startled by a loud bang and lots of flames. A car was on fire in the parking lot.
‘It’s not good’, is the thought of Manuela and Soraya when they bang their guns last night. The mother and daughter had a bad feeling earlier because it has been restless in the parking lot near the flat lately. Soraya: “I heard a lot of noise and laughter as if there were loiterers.” Moments later she hears hiss and a loud bang. “Because I didn’t have my glasses on, I mainly saw an orange spot. But my parents indeed confirmed my bad feeling a little later and told me about the fire.”
Jealousy
Yet not everyone thinks that the hanging youth on the square is behind the attack. A neighbor of one floor thinks it was too early for that. “Usually they make noise later in a square further on, but now it was only eleven o’clock.” She thinks people were annoyed by the way the car was parked. “Families here sometimes have four cars. There is often a fight over a parking space.”
She too witnessed the flames shooting out of the burning car. “You saw that all the neighbors quickly brought their own cars to safety.” The burned-out car is now standing on a line between two parking spaces. “Some people think they can do it all, but don’t pay a penny more road tax than the rest.”
Unsafe feeling
Manuela and Soraya agree: “It doesn’t feel safe here after the fire.” Soraya has lived in the flat for more than 16 years and has seen the neighborhood change from a cozy neighborhood to a neighborhood ‘where everyone does whatever it takes’. Manuela also no longer feels comfortable in her own neighbourhood. “Many seniors move away or die. More and more separate figures are taking their place and that gives an unsafe feeling.”
At the beginning of this year there were several car fires in Zaanstad. Especially in and around the Poelenburg district it was often hit. A suspect has now been arrested there. The police are investigating whether this fire in De Grote Beer was arson.