Rotterdam Trivia
Rotterdam trivia for expats in Netherlands. You may earn yourself a gold star at the next pub quiz with these non-essential fun facts about Holland’s second biggest city.
ROTTERDAM TRIVIA & FUN FACTS
- The Rotterdam city flag is 3 equal size horizontal stripes: green, white, green
- Rotterdam’s population of 671,000 (2023) is approximately the same as the cities of Washington DC (USA), Las Vegas NV (USA), El Paso TX (USA), Boston MA (USA), Helsinki (FI), Seville (ES) and Copenhagen (DK)
- Rotterdam’s Witte Huis at 43 meters (14 stories) in height, was the tallest building in Europe from 1898-1908.
- At 215 meters (65.2 stories) high, Rotterdam’s De Zalmhaven tower is the tallest building in the Netherlands and the entire Benelux region.
- The five tallest buildings in Netherlands are all in Rotterdam: De Zalmhaven (215m), Maastoren (165m), New Orleans (158m), Cooltoren (154m) and Montevideo (152m)
- The Euromast tower was 100 meters tall when it was constructed for the 1960 Floriade. Ten years later its height was extended an additional 85 meters. It now stands at 185 meters.
- The Erasmusbrug is 139 meters tall. It has the longest span of any bridge in Netherlands (280 meters). The Willemsbrug has the second longest span at 270 meters. Both bridges cross the Nieuwe Maas river.
- The Port of Rotterdam was the largest port in the world for 42 years (1962-2004) until being overtaken by the Port of Shanghai. It remains the world’s largest port outside of Asia.
- In 2004, the Port of Rotterdam Authority became an independent agency (public limited company), with full responsibility for the management, operation and development of the port. The company is 70% owned by the Municipality of Rotterdam and 30% owned by the Dutch government.
- Rotterdam was the largest spy city during WWI due to its central location between Great Britain, Germany and occupied Belgium and the country’s declared neutrality.
- Lijnbaan in Rotterdam city center was the first car-free shopping street in Europe when it opened in 1953.
- The largest chocolate bar (by area) ever made was in Rotterdam in 2020 by chocolatiers Frits van Noppen, Jeroen Hollestein, Niek Verhoeven and Simon Koster. It measured 383.24 m2.
- The Laurenskerk (completed 1525) is the only medieval building still standing in Rotterdam (after the May 1940 bombing by the Nazis destroyed the city center).
- The Netherlands oldest football club is Sparta Rotterdam (founded 1888).
- Rotterdam is the only Dutch city with 3 football teams that regularly play in the top-level Eredivisie: Feyenoord, Sparta and Excelsior.
- Rotterdam’s Zuiderpark is the largest city park in Netherlands (215 hectares).
- The Rotterdam Marathon is the biggest marathon in Netherlands with 17,000 runners. The organizers want to raise the limit on participants to 30,000 for the 2026 edition.
- The first car tunnel built in Netherlands was Rotterdam’s Maastunnel (opened 1942).
- The first subway built in Netherlands was in Rotterdam (opened 1968).
- Rotterdam-The Hague Airport has an elevation of -4m (14ft below sea level), the 10th lowest airport in the world.
- Rotterdam is home to the ‘biggest indoor jazz music festival in the world’, the North Sea Jazz Festival since 2006 (previously held in The Hague).
- Rotterdam hosted the Eurovision Song Contest in 2021 (after the 2020 edition was cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic). The Netherlands had won Eurovision in 2019 with Duncan Laurence‘s song ‘Aracde‘, making Laurence the only artist ever to hold the Eurovision title for 2 years with the same song. Sadly he did not perform live on the 2021 Grand Finale show after testing positive for Covid-19.
- Rotterdam’s former mayor Ahmed Aboutaleb was the first Muslim mayor in the Netherlands.
- Carola Schouten is the first female mayor of Rotterdam.
People born in Rotterdam include…
- Pieter de Hooch (Painter)
- Willem de Kooning (Painter)
- Betty Stove (Tennis Player)
- Richard Krajicek (Tennis Player)
- Robin van Persie (Footballer)
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