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Cyclists need to understand that they can make pedestrian life much worse without actually killing pedestrians, which I agree is rare. I spend time in Amsterdam semi-regularly for work, and the Dutch are presumably the biggest cyclists in Europe. You cannot walk around without constantly being alert. Not because of crime, which at least in the wealthy city center (including the red light district, museum quarter, Jordaan, business district etc) seems rare, with the streets safe even at night, but because of the cyclists.
The Dutch seem to have a lot of marked and unmarked cycle lanes, but the problem with any dense city is that (of course) you constantly have to cross them most times you turn to a new street, change direction, cross the street, whatever. They cycle extremely fast and with minimal concern for their own safety. Even if you just miss them they ring their bells at you and sometimes shout at you. The whole experience of walking in Amsterdam - a city so pedestrianized that many of the non-arterial central streets mostly or fully ban cars, or so deter them that only the occasional taxi or delivery truck goes down them at 3 mph - is unpleasant as a result.
When road traffic does run alongside cycle paths, crossing the street is even more annoying, since even a small road becomes a multi lane stroad crossing when you first have to navigate the cycle lane, then the car lanes, then the cycle lane on the opposite side. The speed of the motor and bike traffic is also completely different so it’s much harder to judge whether you can jaywalk (which is necessary to get anywhere in a timely manner in most dense cities). It just sucks. Walkable cities only work if the experience of walking is low stress and chill - in other words if you can put your AirPods in and relax, or call your mom, or dictate an email, without worrying about getting mugged/assaulted by an addict/hit by a cyclist. This is a low bar and many cities have achieved it.
I love cycling. It’s fun, in the countryside, on nice bike lanes, with few pedestrians or cars nearby, seeing nature, stopping at a lake for a picnic and a swim, mountain biking in the summer, all good. In cities? No, it sucks. The combination of public transport and walking is good for navigation, with taxis for the lazy, elderly, disabled or rich. Cyclists make walkable cities less walkable.
I think you're very much in a minority here. I would take walking around Amsterdam vs literally any major north american city, and above most European ones as well.
I agree there's a tradeoff, but Amsterdam demonstrably works as a walkable city, even if it's not somewhere you can just zone out and walk.
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I cycle through Amsterdam city center very regularly and any part of the city where you might visit as an outsider is totally not representative of a city with good cycling infrastructure (which is almost every Dutch urban area except center of Amsterdam). Narrow 17th century canals with uneven side-streets and rarely any sidewalks wider than 1.5 Americans. It is a city designed for boats and commerce, not for a million tourists strolling around unaware of their surroundings. Also the cars are blocked from the city not for pedestrians but for the bikes. The problems you describe arise because unlike many other old touristic European city centers, Amsterdam is not simply a tourist attraction and has a very dense population who live and work in it. These people go almost everywhere almost entirely by bike. Cyclists you come across aren't a separate breed of people, I have literally never met anyone in this country (except 2 American expats) who don't bike in their daily lives.
Also they shout at you because you are a tourist and they hate you.
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