Lelystad

is a municipality and a city in the centre of the Netherlands, and it is the capital of the province of Flevoland. The city, built on reclaimed land, was founded in 1951 and was named after Cornelis Lely, who engineered the Afsluitdijk, making the reclaiming possible. Lelystad is approximately 5 meters (16 feet) below sealevel.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Lelystad is area-wise the largest municipality in the Netherlands. A big part of that area is water: Markermeer and IJsselmeer. Another major area is the internationally famous nature park Oostvaardersplassen, which spontaneously grew when the polder of South Flevoland was drained. Lelystad is also surrounded by "a square of woodlands and parks" and flat farmland. The location of the city makes weather & skies especially beautiful. The importance of the landscape & sky is emphasized by several pieces of land art: engineers' work & arts like the Observatorium by Robert Morris (see below).

Municipality: A municipality or "general-purpose district" (compare with: "special-purpose district") is an administrative local area generally composed of a clearly defined territory and commonly referring to a city, town, or village government....

City: :For alternate meanings see city (disambiguation)...

Netherlands: The Netherlands (Dutch: Nederland; IPA pronunciation: /"ne:d?rlant/) is the European part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands that is formed by the Netherlands, the Netherlands Antilles and Aruba.(Dutch: Koninkrijk der Nederlanden). The Netherlands is a parliamentary democracy under a constitutional m...