Instant Cities: Rotterdam

Rotterdam › Places and landmarks

The port

The biggest port in Europe, which runs some 40 kilometres from the city to the North Sea.

Play Rotterdam Watch the tour

Photo: AgainErick, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Rotterdam grew with its port, where the Rhine and the Maas reach the sea. From 1962 to 2004 it was the busiest port in the world, and it is still the biggest of Europe, with docks, oil terminals and container quays all the way out to the Maasvlakte on reclaimed land in the North Sea.

Boats take visitors on harbour tours from the foot of the Erasmusbrug, past the cranes and the ships of the Waalhaven and the Eemhaven. Ride through Rotterdam in 3D ›

More in Rotterdam

City HallRotterdam’s town hall of 1920 on the Coolsingel, one of the few buildings in the centre that came through the bombing of 1940. Erasmus BridgeThe white cable-stayed bridge over the Maas, nicknamed the Swan, which became the sign of the new Rotterdam. Witte HuisThe white office building of 1898 by the Oude Haven, one of the first high-rise buildings in Europe. Oude HavenRotterdam’s oldest harbour, full of old sailing barges, with terraces along its quays. Cube housesPiet Blom’s yellow houses tilted on their corners, a forest of cubes on top of a footbridge over the Blaak. MarkthalA horseshoe arch of flats over a covered market, with the biggest artwork in the Netherlands on its ceiling. LaurenskerkThe great late-Gothic church of the city, burnt out in 1940 and rebuilt, the last medieval building of the centre. SchielandshuisA 17th-century classical palace among the towers, which came through the bombing of 1940. Maritiem MuseumThe maritime museum on the Leuvehaven, with old cranes, a lightship and working boats moored outside. De Verwoeste StadOssip Zadkine’s bronze figure with a hole torn through its body, the memorial to the bombing of 1940. LijnbaanEurope’s first shopping street built for people on foot, opened in 1953 in the rebuilt centre. EuromastThe tower in Het Park by the Maas, built for the Floriade of 1960 and raised to 185 metres in 1970.