The Myth of Fullness

In the public and political discourse, The Netherlands is often portrayed as an overcrowded country. Consequently, the term “fullness” is frequently used as a complaint or a warning. This evokes images of packed trains, clogged highways and a chronic housing shortage rather than people connecting this to increasing social safety, the liveliness of the streets, and the enjoyment of events. It is a heavily loaded term, both political and philosophical, but rarely underpinned by spatial designers. While the term suggests physical congestion, it lacks a clear definition. This ambiguity leads to misunderstandings, and the definition of fullness is often reduced to a matter of factual land use.

Thus fullness predominantly carries a negative connotation but what if we were to invert this perspective? What if we no longer ceased to view fullness as a limitation, but as a starting point for spatial quality? This paper focuses on spatial quality rather than factual quantity. The central shift occurs from a politically charged problem to a spatial opportunity.

In this paper, fullness is approached as a multi-layered phenomenon dividing it into five spatial layers: the physical, the functional, the perceptual, the cultural, and the ecological. Altogether, these layers shape the definition of fullness. 

The debate around the fullness of the Netherlands is far from new. As early as 1950, when the population had reached ten million, Queen Juliana warned that the country was becoming full. In 1979, with an addition of four million inhabitants, she echoed this concern and famously declared: “The Netherlands is full, even overcrowded in parts” (Stichting PDC, 1979). Her words were built upon by influential figures such as economist Jan Pen, who in 1997 stated: “The Netherlands is full, full, full.” (Smalhout & Stichting Sociale Databank Nederland, 2003). 

In the years that followed, the concept gained increasing political weight and figures like Hans Janmaat linked fullness explicitly to immigration. It is striking to see how little grasp we seem to have on what “full” actually means. In 2022, with a population nearing 18 million, Paul Scheffer remarked: “We have no idea how many people the Netherlands can house.” (Scheffer, 2022). In this statement lies the core of this paper: fullness is rarely a concept defined by urban design, where I believe spatial designers can design a solution.

The Netherlands is with 533 inhabitants per square kilometre the most densely populated country on the European mainland (Centraal Bureau voor de Statistiek, 2024). Shockingly, the spatial expression of this density states otherwise: where one might expect futuristically urban skylines, the reality is a vast low-rise landscape. Space has been divided but is rarely planned efficiently. The dominating typology of ground-level single-family homes with private gardens combined with a complex network of roads and amenities leads to a horizontal sprawl. This results in the high spatial footprint per person we see in the news. In a conversation with Brazilian urbanist Silva Costa, this tension was clearly articulated: “The challenge is to rethink how new areas are being developed.” (P. Silva Costa, personal communication, May 14, 2025).

This urban sprawl underlines a growing challenge for governments, developers, and citizens. Especially in the Randstad, where spatial pressure is causing cities to eat all its surrounding landscapes. As Iranian urbanist GhanbariFard observed: “Even coming from a capital city like Tehran with the hustle and rushed life of the modern era, the cities in the Randstad, especially Rotterdam and Amsterdam evoke a sense of fullness.” (P. GhanbariFard, personal communication, May 5, 2025).

Despite the high density on a national level, Dutch cities often do not feel urban but rather equally spread, minimizing the possibility of truly escaping the built environment. French urbanist Soret put it sharply: “The Netherlands lacks places to really escape the city.” (L. Soret, personal communication, May 6, 2025). Even in supposedly green areas, human presence is strongly felt due to the openness revealing infrastructure and city skylines.

Comparisons with other countries bring this notion of physical fullness into sharper focus. A Serbian urbanist pointed out that although Serbia has a significantly lower population density of 90 inhabitants per square kilometre. “Serbian cities often feature high-rise buildings allowing the surrounding landscape to feel more spacious and open” (Anonymous, personal communication, May 14, 2025).

As a contrasting example, I would like to bring the example of Taiwan up: “Taiwan has even more people per square kilometre than the Netherlands, but their density is very clustered, surrounded by real, wild, not-yet-contained nature.” (Y. Chen, personal communication, May 14, 2025). With an average of 647 inhabitants per kilometre, Taiwan has a higher pressure on its population that is spatially concentrated in compact urban centres. This creates zones of true emptiness and ecological richness, something that is very rare in the Netherlands.

Ecological fullness refers to the point when the carrying capacity of natural systems is reached (full) or exceeded (too full). Unlike perceptual or cultural fullness, this form of fullness is not based on experience but on biogeochemical reality. The state of our soil, water systems, nitrogen cycle, air quality, biodiversity, and climate determine whether the country is full, ecologically speaking. There is no room for interpretation here only for action or consequence.

In the Netherlands, this point has already been crossed on multiple fronts. Decades of intensive land use have ecologically overused the country. High nitrogen deposition forms an acute risk to vulnerable natural areas, particularly on sandy soils and peatlands. According to a Dutch Government Agency, lots of ‘protected’ natural sites such as Natura 2000 are now under structural pressure (Planbureau voor de Leefomgeving, 2024). Moreover, the Netherlands scores the lowest in Europe in terms of biodiversity per square kilometre, directly linked to intensive agriculture, infrastructure pressure, and habitat fragmentation.

Spatial policy often still operates as if ecological space can be endlessly stretched. New housing developments, roads, and data centres are frequently designed like they have always been designed, without taking ecological constraints as a starting point.

Ecological fullness needs a fundamental revision of our spatial priorities where we should shift from exploitation to preservation and from addition to repair. French urbanist Soret puts it plainly: “Ecology should receive the most priority – it is the one and only hard limit of fullness.” (L. Soret, personal communication, May 6, 2025. Where other forms of fullness can be negotiated, or reframed through perception or design, the ecological boundary is absolute. Unfortunately, nature does not negotiate.

Adcknowledging ecological fullness presents an opportunity. As Italian urbanist Grilli articulates: “The experience of fullness is a vital step in recognising that there is a problem” (J. Grilli, personal communication, May 13, 2025).  Whether fullness is real or not, the feeling reveals the place’s deepest problems.

In countries like Brazil, Iran, Serbia, or Poland, ecology is often ignored in design processes. The feeling of fullness is not a weakness, but a necessary warning sign that we can no longer afford to ignore ecological reality

If fullness is not a boundary but a design condition, it demands a new approach to how we shape space. The five layers of fullness show that the fullness arises from diverse fields of tension, physical, functional, perceptual, cultural, and ecological. Each of these layers calls for its spatial response. The following five design principles are not only formulated to respond to these layers but to actively use them as raw material for designing spatial quality.

1. Compact layering instead of horizontal expansion. In response to physical fullness, we must intensify space vertically rather than the urban sprawl we are used to. This means striving for higher densities where possible, with attention to quality, and liveability, leaving space for the recovery of nature.

2. Prioritizing and interweaving functions. Functional fullness demands making clear choices in the spatial debate. Design must dare to prioritize while seeking synergies between functions: living and working, agriculture and nature and mobility. By combining functions within the existing urban fabric, space is used more efficiently and above all, more meaningfully.

3. Designing at eye level. Perceptual fullness shows that the feeling of fullness often stems from a lack of human scale, rhythm, or sensory stimulation. Design should therefore be driven by the experience at eye level instead of by square meters. Variation, transparency, and material richness make space understandable, familiar, and liveable, even at high densities.

4. Space for the shared and the unexpected. Cultural fullness reveals that the Dutch mindset tries to overregulate. However, especially in a tightly organized country, it is vital to allow room for spontaneity and social interaction. This requires flexible structures, shared spaces, and above all, less overly designed spaces. Not everything needs to be perfect, sometimes, roughness is the greatest quality.

5. Designing within ecological limits. Finally, ecological fullness is the non-negotiable boundary in the use of space. Soil, water, nitrogen, and biodiversity should not be seen as residual categories but as starting points for design. This is not a restriction, but a redirection. We should shape the city around nature instead of the other way around. In doing so, something shifts as we feel closer to the earth, and the country begins to feel less full.

The phrase “The Netherlands is full” is a misleading myth. When you look beyond the misplaced political arguments and incomplete news articles, you will find a land with space to house even more people. Fullness is the inevitable result of an overly designed country rather than a country with too many people. By reframing fullness as a layered condition, this paper has shown that fullness works across five layers where each of these layers holds its tensions.

Rather than treating fullness as an objective problem, this layered perspective invites us to see it as a design question: a lens through which new possibilities emerge. The Netherlands is not full, it is inefficient, segregated, often monotonous, overregulated, and ecologically overburdened. On the contrary, this feeling of fullness also presents the way forward: toward spatial compactness, functional interweaving, sensory richness, cultural openness, and ecological restraint.

The design principles are not blueprints, but signposts. They help us think differently about fullness. This is not an endpoint but a call for design quality instead of quantity. Especially in a country where every square meter counts. 

Those who say the Netherlands is full are actually saying that the system no longer works the way we are familiar with. Therefore, fullness is a myth and should not be seen as a limit, but a call for change. An invitation to reshape space, layered, shared, and sustained by design-driven optimism.