Oldenzaal, Provincie Overijssel, Netherlands

🇳🇱 Oldenzaal is a municipality and a city in the eastern province of Overijssel in the Netherlands. It is part of the region of Twente and is close to the German border. It received city rights in 1249. Historically, the city was part of the Hanseatic League as a subsidiary city of the fellow Hanseatic city of Deventer.

Located on the A1 motorway from Amsterdam to Germany, Oldenzaal also has a rail connection to Hengelo. In the Netherlands, Oldenzaal is well known for its carnival festivities. During the carnival season Oldenzaal is known as "Boeskool-stad" which is a local dialect of the word Cabbage-town. During the main carnival weekend over 100,000 people come for the big parade showing high and mighty carnival trucks.

Economy Together with Rijssen, Oldenzaal forms the national top in terms of economic growth per square kilometer. This is stimulated by its location on the A1, the motorway that opens up the city.

For the city promotion, the city has given itself the name Smile of Twente.

Oldenzaal companies are active in the following sectors, among others: subcontracting for the automotive industry, construction, installation technology, food industry (delicacies, snacks, bakeries), financial advice and in particular the transport sector. The flowering of the truck transport system in Oldenzaal is abundantly clear. There are many large Oldenzaal transport companies.

Facilities and culture In the Pentagon and De Driehoek are the two largest shopping centres in Oldenzaal. Within the municipality there is an association that manages a city organ, the Piepenrek. There are many entertainment venues in Oldenzaal.

In Advent and Christmas time, the characteristic sound of the midwinter horn sounds around the St. Michael's Basilica and from the tower of this church. During the Christmas celebrations in this twelfth-century Romanesque basilica, the centuries-old Een Kindelien so lovelyc sounds, a Christmas carol that has been sung in Oldenzaal since time immemorial. The history of Oldenzaal is the subject in Museum Palthehuis, which also organizes exhibitions of contemporary visual arts.

Sports and recreation • Football: The first team of Quick '20 will be in 1st class Saturday. Other football clubs from Oldenzaal are: FC Berghuizen, VV Oldenzaal and ZVV De Esch. • Women's football: FC Berghuizen' first team will play in the big league • Volleyball: VV Pollux's first women's team was played in the premier league from 1991 to 2012, the highest level of play in the Netherlands. During that period, the national championship was won five times. In 2012, the Eredivisie license was transferred to Team Eurosped from Almelo and since then Pollux's first women's team has been playing in the lower classes. • Water polo: Oldenzaalse Zwem en Polo Club (OZ&PC) is an Oldenzaal swimming and water polo club. The first team will play in the big league from the 2009-2010 season. • Bowls Oldenzaal, Sport with curved balls originally from England. • Skating:Oldenzaalse IJsclub (OIJC) is the skating club of Oldenzaal. Training is carried out on the IJsbaan Twente in Enschede and further on the ice rink in Het Hulsbeek with sufficient frost. • Tennis Oldenzaal has three tennis clubs (Quick, TZB and Ready), a hockey club (OHC Bully) and a handball club (HACOL '90). • Rugby: The RCO Harlequins association was founded in 2005. • Oldenzaal is surrounded by a park-like landscape with hills. The Tankenberg, part of the Oldenzaal moraine, is the highest ‘mountain’ in Overijssel at eighty-five meters. This hill is located just outside Oldenzaal in the municipality of Losser. • In recreation area Het Hulsbeek there are swimming ponds, a snake run for skateboarders, an equestrian centre and a bastery track. The ballooning event Twente Ballooning is also held here every year. • Straight through Oldenzaal runs the European long-distance hiking trail E11, also known on site as Marskramerpad or Handelsweg. • An outdoor go-kart track is located in Oldenzaal.

Transport: Auto Oldenzaal is located on the A1 from Amsterdam to the German border where it turns into the Bundesautobahn 30 to Osnabrück. This section of the A1 is also part of the international motorway E30 from Cork to Berlin and on to Russia's Omsk.

Transport: Train and bus On the railway area, Oldenzaal station is located on the original railway line from Almelo to Salzbergen in Germany and on to Berlin. From Oldenzaal there is a direct connection with Hengelo and further to Zutphen provided by Syntus Twente. Since February 2018, Oldenzaal has been served by the Eurobahn which runs trains between Hengelo and Bielefeld. Next to the train station, several buses that connect Oldenzaal to other places in Twente stop.

Transport: Air Nearby is the former military airport Twente Airport, which has a limited function for civil aviation. It may be used for small business and recreational aviation traffic. Since 2017, the company AELS (Aircraft End-of-Life Solutions) has established itself at the airport. AELS dismantles aircraft such as the Boeing 747, Airbus A340 and Boeing 737.