Post by : Meena Ariff

Photo: Reuters

One of Europe’s most famous bridges, the Öresund Bridge, is celebrating 25 years since it first opened. This bridge joins Denmark’s capital, Copenhagen, with Malmö, Sweden’s third-largest city. Even today, it continues to change how people travel and do business between the two countries.

A 28-year-old software engineer, Oskar Damkjaer, lives in Copenhagen and works for a Swedish company. Twice a week, he travels to Malmö by train using the bridge, which takes about 40 minutes. He says, “People think it’s a big deal to travel to another country for work, but I find it quite easy.”

Another traveler, Laurine Deschamps, works in Copenhagen at a gaming company but lives in Malmö. She goes to work four times a week and prefers Malmö because it is smaller, peaceful, and easy to walk everywhere, unlike the busy capital city.

The idea of the bridge started in 1991 when Denmark and Sweden decided to build a permanent link. Before the bridge, people used ferries or short flights to cross. The bridge was built in five years and cost about $4.3 billion. It is 16 km long, including a tunnel section, and is the longest road and rail bridge in the European Union.

Traveling on the bridge gives beautiful views of the sea, and its tall metal pillars look amazing. It even inspired a popular Scandinavian crime TV series called The Bridge.

The bridge has greatly improved life in the region:

• Commuting between the two countries has increased by over 400%.
• Many Swedes and Danes have moved across the bridge to live in the other country.
• There has been a 73% rise in people starting businesses on the other side.

A manager from a gaming company who helped open their Malmö studio in 2019 said the bridge makes her feel powerful as she can work in both Denmark and Sweden and help develop the gaming industry in both countries.

The bridge has also attracted many businesses to Malmö, creating new jobs. Big companies like Ikea have offices there. Many business owners prefer Malmö over Stockholm because it has modern offices near train stations and is close to Copenhagen Airport.

Malmö has also seen more tech startups and science companies in recent years. Research shows it now has more patents than other big Swedish cities like Gothenburg and Stockholm. Trade between Denmark and Sweden is also 25% higher because of the bridge.

In 2024, a record number of people used the train across the bridge, with about 41,000 journeys each day. This is higher than before the pandemic, but now overcrowding has become a problem. New bigger trains to solve this will arrive only after 2030.

However, most commuters travel from Malmö to Copenhagen for work. Very few people go the other way because Copenhagen has higher salaries and more job options as a capital city.

For example, a Danish online fashion company recently moved its main office back to Copenhagen. Its CEO said it was hard to attract young Danish workers to Malmö, even though the journey was short. He also said commuting is expensive – the train ticket costs about $17 one way, and driving costs around $80 without discounts. Different rules about pensions and taxes in Denmark and Sweden also create problems for workers.

In January, new rules were made to make income tax easier for commuters. But cultural differences remain. Danes are known to speak directly, while Swedes prefer making decisions together after listening to everyone, which sometimes causes confusion at work.

Despite these challenges, the bridge remains a strong symbol of connection. It inspired new projects like the tunnel between Denmark and Germany and possible plans for a bridge between Finland and Sweden.

Authorities are also discussing future links like new tunnels or a subway between Malmö and Copenhagen. Experts believe more connections will be built in the coming years as they are needed to keep the two countries closely connected.