‘We need to accept the weeds’: Dutch towns compete to remove the most garden paving

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Independent: Scott Trust Limited

‘We need to accept the weeds’: Dutch towns compete to remove the most garden paving

The national ‘tile whipping’ contest is helping the Netherlands to reach its environmental targetsTineke Menalda sits in the sun on her front step, nursing a cup of coffee and idly plucking out the odd weed. Three years ago, the front of her terrace house in Amersfoort was completely paved. But now, sitting in a lush garden of trees and green, she is an official ambassador for the strangest new sport in the Netherlands: tegelwippen, “tile whippi…