Scheveningen’s seaside pier will close next week because of fire safety fears, the city council has decided.

Scheveningen pier was declared bankrupt at the beginning of this year after its owner, hotel and catering family Van der Valk, failed to find a buyer. Efforts to find an owner through an auction also flopped at the beginning of this month.

The pier was put up for sale in March but parts of it were closed to the public in November because it was no longer considered safe.

The Van der Valks bought the pier in 1991 for the symbolic amount of one guilder.

The current pier dates from 1961. The original pier, designed in 1900 and stretching 380 metres into the sea, was destroyed by the Germans during World War II.