In this video I’m taking a look at an interesting bicycle tunnel in the Netherlands, the Benelux Tunnel, located near Rotterdam.
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BENELUX was a pre-EU international economic co-operation pact between these 3 countries.
Only years later first the EEC (European economic community) and then EU were formed.
It is called Benelux tunnel because we wanted to honour the Benelux treaty. And in addition it is the most important route from Rotterdam to Antwerp. That border crossing near Breda is the busiest in the world. Fortunately there are no checks to speak of anymore because of Benelux and Schengen treaties.
Indeed… mammoeth lifted the Kursk…and also lifted the London Eye…
That building is not the harbour controltower…it is actually the big black box on that concrete pillar at the start of your second shotlocation…
Greetings from Pernis. It is my hometown and for a few years I used the tunnel every day. The trick is to build up a lot of speed downwards so it is easyer to go up. And DFDS is a ferry to England.
Mamoet; They lifted/Salvaged the Kursk submarine. btw there's an elevator on both sides as well
You should make a video about cycling through the Maastunnel near the Euromast in Rotterdam, and not just the tunnel is way longer then this one, the escalators are also.
The nieuwe maas is not an artificial canal, but part of the river/maas delta. It is heavily modified for the Rotterdam harbour, so it might look artificial, but it is not.
Might i suggest google for some background information for your video's 😀
It can also provide you information about the history of the tunnel and why it is called the benelux tunnel.
Your story about de Nieuwe Maas is totally incorrect, you only had the name right.
You missed the other cyclepath without the escalator just around the corner. I hit 60 km going down.
The whole Netherlands is a delta, and the Nieuwe Maas is the constructed mouth of the Rijn/Rhine.
You’re absolutely right!
It’s better to place your front wheel perpendicular to the frame (the handlebars parallel) so that the front wheel can rest completely on the step of the escalator, it prevents your bike from sliding down backwards (when going up) or falling down forward (when going down). The brakes will also do it, but you have to keep pulling the handbrakes constantly. Placing your front wheel perpendicular is easier.
Last may I made a bicycle vacation. I went through the maas tunnel, where the escalator is a bit longer. Going down I had to lean backwards because of al the luggage. Going up I had to lean forward. In Antwerp we went through the Sint-Anna tunnel, but there we took the elevator 😊.
Mammoet is a pretty cool company. You should look up some of the stuff they do, like transporting entire oil rigs in one piece.
The port of Rotterdam is enormous. It even was the largest port in the world until not that long ago!
It’s may be an idea when making a movie about a tunnel that you try to film the actual tunnel and not 90% of the time your own head.
The Mammoet company, actually salvaged the Russian nuke submarine Kursk , back in 2000. Together with Dutch marine salvage company Smit International , Mammoet did the lifting work.
Cool you featured this, a very thorough explanation!
For us NL cyclists this is one of the few crossings of the Nieuwe Waterweg, there are some bridges and ferries, but these are quite a bit apart.
Actually the Benelux tunnel has another parallel path (apart from the cycling and car tunnel), this is the "moped tunnel". Weirdly enough It is in between the two car tunnels and is restricted to mopeds (due to the steeper parts).
But I know from 'sources' (shhhh! ), that more serious road cyclists do tend to use this path as well. But I know (from sources) that the final climbs are pretty steep and therefore discouraged for 'normal' cyclists.
Interesting place!
In an attempt to reconcile the story about this waterway (artificial or not): the part where the Beneluxtunnel crosses, is the ‘Nieuwe Maas’ it’s a natural river arm. Most if not all of the water flowing through it, is—as you mentioned—Rhine water. A few kilometers further to the west, a section of the same waterway is named ‘Scheur’ (‘rip’). Scheur takes us another 13 kilometers west. After that, the last 5 kilometers or so to the North Sea, are named ‘Nieuwe Waterweg’. While ‘Scheur’ is still part of the original river system (but heavily canalized), Nieuwe Waterweg is a fully artificial canal dug in the second half of the 19th. century. It’s indeed the most important infrastructural factor for Rotterdam’s success as a large sea port.
https://nl.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nieuwe_Waterweg#/media/Bestand:Rotterdam_en_de_nieuwe_waterweg_naar_zee,_1857.jpg
There is also e tunnel for slow traffic. On my road bike I take one.
2:47 the building is called ‘de Bolder’. It is Mammoets office building. The building was constructed indoors in a shipyard – in one piece! And then it was transported to its current position (in one piece!) by Mammoet – because that is what they do: lift and transport immensely large objects