Rotterdam will dismantle the heff bridge so that a sailing yacht from the founder of Amazon, Jeff Bezoscan cross it, a controversial decision since the city council promised not to touch this national monument after its restoration in 2017.
As confirmed to Efe by Ton Wesselink, the president of the Historical Society of Rotterdam, the city council has already authorized the tasks to dismantle this bridge and, although “The risk of damage to the structure can be reduced to almost zero because the tasks will be done by professional people, the risk will always be there & rdquor;he acknowledged, and this is a historical monument.
“We don’t have many historic buildings in Rotterdam.. Many monuments were lost during the war, and we like this bridge very much. It has been restored a few years ago and it was promised not to touch it, so it is not understood that now, as if nothing happened and because a ship wants to pass through, we have to dismantle it. There will always be a risk that it will suffer damage & rdquor ;, she denounced.
Bezos, considered the richest man in the worldcommissioned a Dutch company to build a giant yacht that will have three masts, so it will not be able to pass under the bridge, which led the company to ask the municipality to dismantle the central structure and the costs will be borne by Bezos himself.
The bridge, built in 1878, was severely damaged during bombing in the 1940s in World War II. and it was one of the first structures in the city to be restored after the war, but when in 1993 rail traffic stopped passing through this bridge, the city scrapped a plan to demolish it due to the strong resistance of the residents of Rotterdam.
Marcel Walravens, municipal manager for matters relating to De Hef, told the local newspaper ‘Rijnmond’ that The shipbuilder’s request was granted because “it refers to the passage of a ship with tall masts mainly & rdquor; and he recalled that in other bridges “you can press a button and they open, but that is not possible with De Hef because it has a maximum height & rdquor ;.
According to him, is not “practical” only partially finish the ship in the area where it is being built in the municipality of Alblasserdamin the west of the Netherlands, to move it through De Hef and then finish building it elsewhere. The estimated value of the ship is 430 million euros and, with some 127 meters long, it will be the largest sailing yacht in the world.
Walravens stressed that the economic interest of the region was considered to grant the requestsince “from a financial and employment perspective, this project is very important”.
remembered that “Rotterdam has been declared the maritime capital of Europeand shipbuilding and activity within the sector are an important pillar”.
The plan is to restore the central part of the bridge after the yacht passes and clarified the municipality’s promise not to dismantle the structure again after a large-scale restoration in 2017: “Never say never, I see it as using the resources you have in the most efficient way possible & rdquor ;.
It is not clear when these tasks will be carried out, nor how the bridge will be dismantled, but “the preparation will take about a week, there are many cables in De Hef and as soon as you remove the first one, nothing works anymore & rdquor ;. Wesselink believes the project will be done sometime this summer.
hope is remove the central part of the bridge in a matter of days “and with a bit of luck” put everything back in its place “in a week & rdquor ;, the city council said.
“Let’s hope that Bezos pays the municipality enough money so that we can invest it in maintaining our national heritage. These things cannot be done just like that & rdquor ;, Wesselink lamented to Efe.