Rotterdam's Famous Bridge Will Be Dismantled Just So Jeff Bezos Can Move His $485M Yacht
"De Hef" needs to make way for De Jeff.
When engineers started building Rotterdam's famous Koningshaven Bridge in the late 1800s, they definitely didn't expect it to be a problem for the mega-yachts of 2022.
Officials in the Dutch city say they're planning to partially dismantle the iconic bridge, nicknamed "De Hef," and they're doing it entirely because of "De Jeff."
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has a $485-million mega-yacht being built at a shipyard in nearby Alblasserdam, and it's going to be too tall to fit through the bridge en route to the ocean, the N.L. Times reports. The three-mast ship is expected to measure 417 feet tall, and that'll make it too big to get through, the Washington Post reports.
But the city is going to make a few changes for the hard-luck billionaire, with a plan to take off the top of the bridge this summer over the course of a few weeks.
“It’s the only route to the sea,” a Rotterdam spokesperson explained to the AFP. He added that Bezos will personally pay for the bridge alterations, and said it'll all be worth it because of the jobs he's supported at the nearby shipyard.
The move has caused much anger among the Dutch, who are upset to see their historic bridge taken down to accommodate a billionaire and his giant boat.
"Jobs are important, but there are limits with what you can and should do with our industrial heritage," Ton Wesselink, head of Rotterdam's local historical society, told Dutch News.
De Hef officially opened in 1927, but it had to be rebuilt following the Second World War. The Dutch national monument also got a major facelift between 2014-2017, and the city promised at the time that it wouldn't be dismantled again, Rijnmond reports.
Of course, that promise was made before the richest guy in the world commissioned the biggest pleasure craft in the world.