The area is just highly constrained by the canals and even as a car driver it's a nightmare to go there. It's a maze of one-way streets, closures and blocks etc. Not representative of a typical Dutch city at all. Nor comparable to Barcelona which has wide streets (ciutad vella etc excluded of course)
All other Dutch cities are very different (except perhaps for a tiny area in the center). Much more boring too though. Mostly new buildings.
But don't consider Amsterdam (the centre at least) as a measure for the rest of the Netherlands, they're very different things :)
Before the bike lanes were common, you had to cut your teeth zipping between the cars in the narrow roads, keeping up with traffic speeds, annoying every driver who gave you an inch, terrifying bewildered tourists, and watching your face get smashed by door after door after door.
When the cycle lanes were rolled out, things became much safer between bikes and cars, but now all bikes are herded together and you experience a bike lane traffic as Mr Expensive Latex seems to have no idea how to pull over to let others pass whilst he's busy clicking in his shoes.
It's very safe now. I kind of miss the mad chaos London used to be when cycling, when only the dumb and the brave dared to battle the busses. When you'd get to work pumped with the adrenaline and the knowledge that you survived the journey
I didn't even experience that and I miss it! Years ago, I watched some TV programme where the protagonist tried to cycle through central London and had multiple terrifying near-misses.
Then I moved there, went for a bike ride and was thinking "what are they on about? there's not _that_ much traffic on the road, there's tons of cyclists, all the buses are pretty cautious, and there's cycle lanes everywhere!"
That's a bit like soldiers missing the war period. You damn adrenaline junkies...
Should Barcelona learn from the Netherlands? Yes.
Should Barcelona be blamed for not being as good as The Netherlands? No.
Only in some streets. Many streets don't have cycle lanes. Or only in one direction, and it's not really clear where to find one in the direction you're going. It's a bit of maze trying to figure it out and in the end you just end up in between the cars..
The crossings aren't that safe either because turning traffic doesn't have their own green timeslot, they're supposed to turn when straight gets green but give way to crossing traffic. But drivers often don't check very well, I often see near misses.
Coming from the Netherlands the bicycle lanes there are really much better with their dedicated green lights, lanes everywhere (almost always in both directions) and separate crossings. They're also better marked and uninterrupted (in some barcelona streets they suddenly just stop or move to another side without clear indication). I definitely don't feel safe cycling in Barcelona. I mainly walk here and take the metro.
I hope the bicycle network will improve going forward as cars are excluded from the city more. They make a good effort so far but it's definitely not great :)