Stories of the ridiculous escapades of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos (and his fellow celebrity billionaires) now regularly make news headlines. Barely a week goes by when they’re not reinventing the bus, flying into (and unfortunately returning from) space, promising to solve the ecological emergency, or manipulating financial markets by tweeting. The latest story involving Bezos has him reportedly asking the local council in Rotterdam to temporarily dismantle the historic Koningshaven Bridge.

This is so his brand-new superyacht, which is being manufactured in the port city, can go through. It’s too large to pass through the bridge (the only route to the sea) normally, which seems like something he might have considered before commissioning it — not least because the bridge was originally constructed in 1878 and later rebuilt after the Nazis bombed it in 1940. It is now a national monument.

After the bridge was renovated in 2017, the council promised that they would never dismantle it again. There have been more recent claims that the application has not actually been made yet, but it’s in the cards. That’s obvious to anybody who has compared the size of the nearly completed superyacht and the iconic bridge.