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The dismantling of Tournai’s gothic Bridge of Holes to make room for larger boats down the Scheldt river has been met with solemn protest and a withering attack on local politicians by a minister in Belgium’s federal government.
After years of argument over the controversial project, a crane attached to a barge was deployed from 6am on Friday morning to take apart the three arches of the Pont des Trous as a local cellist played mournfully on the river bank.
The bridge’s bricks will be retained for its later reconstruction on similar lines to the original, albeit with a wider and higher central arch.
The council had initially supported a contemporary replacement described by opponents as a “Bridge of McDonald’s” due to its similarity to the burger chain’s logo, and officials remain under fire for their willingness to dismantle the landmark.
A solemn crowd on the river’s banks audibly reacted when some of the brickwork was seen falling into the water on Friday. Many watching a live stream on the website of the regional television station, Notele, wrote of their sadness at saying “goodbye”.
Among those on the river bank was Belgium’s minster for energy, Marie-Christine Marghem, who in a Facebook post deplored the “lack of empathy” for local people by the council.
She wrote: “Because a Tournaisien lives his city in joys and sorrows, I am at the foot of our Bridge of Holes since the sunrise to see how institutional killjoys attack a monument without prior heritage procedure, under the gloomy eye of the little local potentates.
“Prima facie, I obviously don’t see any numbered stone. Are we surprised? Throughout, in addition, no word of empathy has been addressed to the population which long expressed in a popular consultation her love for its roots, its identity, its history.”
Built between 1281 and 1304, the Pont des Trous is one of only three remaining 13th-century military bridges in the world.
Bombed and partially destroyed during the second world war, the central arches were rebuilt and widened in 1947. Only its medieval towers – the Bourdiel, built in 1281 on the left bank and the Thieulerie, built on the river’s right bank between 1302-1304 – are original.
The bridge’s name comes from a nearby lock that was called Les Trous, or the holes, by Tournaisiens.
The reconstruction was said to be necessary as part of a (€4.2bn) (£3.8bn) project to create a 65-mile (105km) canal, connecting the Seine and Scheldt rivers. The council wants to allow passage for boats of up to 2,000 tonnes rather than continue with the current 1,500-tonne limit.
But the dismantling of the bridge has been met with resistance throughout the process, with the Belgian prime minister, Charles Michel, asked to intervene.
The criticism was at its most vociferous in 2016 when the council approved plans by the architect Olivier Bastin for a minimalist and contemporary style.
A petition calling for the plan to be ditched attracted more than 20,000 signatures and the backing of the French radio and TV host Stéphane Bern.
It was only in March this year that the minister of public works in the Francophone Walloon region, Carlo Di Antonio, announced that the modern design was being ditched and that the bridge would be rebuilt almost identically.
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