Erasmus Bridge 30 Years: Swan in a Million

September 4, 2026, marked exactly thirty years since Queen Beatrix officially opened the Erasmus Bridge. It is a fitting occasion for a blog post dedicated to Rotterdam’s most famous landmark, featuring historical reflections and personal memories—illustrated with a selection of the many photos I have taken of the bridge over the years.

Identity crisis

In the 1980s, Rotterdam was grappling with an identity crisis. The city center had been rebuilt after the war in a way that many people considered rather unsuccessful: wide roads, massive buildings, dull office districts, and a lack of liveliness.

Meanwhile, the port—a crucial element of Rotterdam’s identity—was shifting further and further west, moving out of sight of the city center. While it was certainly great to have the world’s largest port, its presence was becoming less and less palpable in the heart of the city.

Kop van Zuid

The Binnenhaven, Spoorweghaven, and Rijnhaven docks were falling into disuse, leaving behind abandoned quays and industrial sites, and empty sheds and warehouses. Yet, this also presented opportunities: sometime in the 1980s, the concept of the ‘Kop van Zuid’ suddenly emerged. It offered a chance to integrate the neglected southern area into the city and to allow the center to make the leap across the river.

Remote

Even so, back then, it was difficult to envision what might eventually take shape in that location. The Wilhelmina Pier, in particular, was a remote corner of the city that hardly anyone ever visited. Around 1990, I applied for a job there at an architectural firm that had set up shop in one of the old warehouses. It was a long walk from Rijnhaven metro station, wandering through what I remember as an almost post-apocalyptic harbor landscape.

Skeptics

The only way to integrate that desolate area into the city was by creating a new river crossing. A new bridge extending Coolsingel boulevard, which was given the working title “Coolsingel Bridge.” Riek Bakker, the Director of Urban Planning and Housing, championed the idea and won over a great many people.

However, there were also many skeptical reactions. Wasn’t Rotterdam already spectacular enough, with the Maas River and its evolving skyline? Shouldn’t the city first make the center more lively and inviting before pouring money into various outlying areas? And the residents living at the tip of the Noordereiland were none too pleased about having something new intrude on their view.

Designs

Ultimately, the bridge’s proponents won that debate. But there was no design yet. Municipal architect Maarten Struijs designed a fairly modest “four-mast bridge,” featuring two high and two low pylons. Rob Lubbers, from the construction company Hollandia Kloos, proposed a far more ambitious plan: not just a bridge, but also an island complete with a hotel and a conference center. Ben van Berkel’s angled pylon design—which was the one eventually chosen—falls somewhere in between the two. Okay, van Berkel’s design was forty million guilders more expensive than Struijs’s four-pylon bridge. But the bridge has become such an eye-catcher for the city that the cost has since been recouped.

Erasmus

When the city council chose the name “Erasmus Bridge” in 1992, I—oddly enough—had to get used to it. But Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus is, in fact, the best possible namesake for the bridge. Rotterdam’s most famous resident of all time—a man who, five hundred years ago, was already advocating for freedom, peace, and tolerance. That is certainly the kind of figure a city wants to identify with.

Construction

The pylon was built at a shipyard in Vlissingen. Lying flat on a barge, the massive structure made the journey to Europoort, where it was hoisted upright by an even larger crane. It then continued its journey along the Nieuwe Waterweg and the Nieuwe Maas. Together with my colleagues at OMA, I watched from our office on the Boompjes quay as the pylon was floated into position.

In the months that followed, we watched the elegantly undulating bridge deck slowly take shape. One by one, the stay cables appeared—cables that would metaphorically pull the city center across the river to the South. On the other side of the pylon the massive bascule section of the bridge was installed.

Opening

The Erasmus Bridge was officially opened on September 4, 1996. Queen Beatrix was the first to walk across the bridge, moving from north to south. Three hundred schoolchildren unrolled a ribbon from both sides to symbolically connect the north and the south. A week later, a brunch was held on the bridge for 5,000 Rotterdam residents.

From that moment on, the bridge had a place in the heart of the city, serving as a link between an increasingly vibrant city center and an equally interesting counterpart on the south bank. Rotterdam had definitively become a city on two riverbanks—and that identity crisis was now a thing of the past.

Teething troubles

There were some teething troubles. In strong winds combined with rain, the stay cables began to vibrate alarmingly. The elegantly undulating bridge deck almost started to undulate for real. In November 1996, the bridge was even closed to all traffic as a precaution. It became part of the traditional rivalry between Rotterdam and Amsterdam: the Erasmus Bridge’s stay cables versus the grass at the Arena stadium.

The problem ultimately proved quite simple to solve by installing extra dampers on the stay cables. Yet for months afterward, every minor issue was blown out of proportion in the media. I remember a newspaper headline: “More problems with Erasmus Bridge.” It turned out to be nothing more than a traffic light at Wilhelminaplein that was staying red for too long.

Events

In the decades that followed, the Erasmus Bridge became an inevitable backdrop for major events. The annual marathon, of course, but also the Grands Départs of the Tour de France, hommes et femmes, the Eurovision Song Contest, the national fireworks display, and the World Port Days. During the Dance Parade, it turned out that the shock absorbers also worked against vibrations caused by a dancing crowd. And during The Passion, Jesus—alias singer Danny de Munck—sang from the very top of the pylon, which proved capable of being raised by a meter or so.

Swan

Although Ben van Berkel associated the pylon’s angled shape with harbor cranes, the bridge is popularly known as “The Swan.” I actually never use that nickname myself. I did, however, once see two swans on the bridge. One had likely flown into the stay cables and lay dead on the roadway, while the other was mourning the loss of its partner. It was heartbreaking.

Third City Bridge

Now—more than thirty years after the initial planning for the Erasmus Bridge—there is once again talk of a new city bridge. It is intended to be located at the bend in the River Maas near De Kuip stadium, between the neighborhoods of De Esch and De Veranda. History is repeating itself: the skeptics raise their voices again, and no one wants a new bridge blocking their view. Furthermore, many people still find it difficult to imagine what such a new connection—linking two neighborhoods that previously had no relationship with one another—means for a city. Even now that the Erasmus Bridge has shown just how magnificent the result can be.

Anyway, that is how it has always been. The Nieuwe Waterweg, the Singels, the first docks on the southbank—they were debated for years, but once they were built, they became indispensable. Perhaps the same will happen with the Kuip Bridge. Provided, of course, that it turns out to be at least as beautiful as the Erasmus Bridge. I’d be happy to dedicate a blog post to it in 2065.