It had been dead for a while but residents and police led the coup de grace over the weekend.
Yahoo
Copenhagen’s libertarian Christiana neighbourhood, an old hippie paradise tainted in recent years by drug trafficking violence, has cleared out its famous Pusher Street, where cannabis used to be sold freely.
Under spring sunshine, the mayor of Copenhagen and Denmark’s justice minister on Saturday led a group of residents who tore up the street’s cobblestones while police cleared away the dealers’ former market stands.
In late August, the so-called Christianites decided to close the street, known for its hashish stalls, after the fourth murder in three years shattered the image of a free-spirited and peaceful community.
Pusher Street “has deteriorated into being a really not very nice place,” Hulda Mader, spokeswoman for the Christianites, told AFP.
“They fight each other, they fight people and they are violent,” she added.
On Saturday, some nostalgic locals came to take away souvenir cobblestones.
“It’s a reminder of Christiana, what it used to be and what it isn’t any more,” Adam Hovgaard, a 23-year-old resident of Copenhagen, told AFP.
While the shops have always reappeared after being destroyed by the police, this time the actual removal of the cobblestones is intended to prevent any rebirth.
“We’ll take the cobblestones and give them to people who want some. That’s just a sign that Pusher Street is changing from a pushers’ street to something else,” Mader explained.
For Mader, who is in her 70s and has lived in the area since 1994, support from most of the area’s 1,000 or so residents is crucial.
The dismantling of the street architecture is being carried out in cooperation with the police and the City of Copenhagen.
– Committed residents –
“Their commitment is crucial,” Copenhagen mayor Sophie Haestorp Andersen told AFP.
“It is the first time ever that they united and agreed to take a stand against the rising crime and insecurity in their neighbourhood.
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/denmark-clears-christianias-hippy-cannabis-061133591.html
