The company El Transbordador de Vizcaya S.L. holds the administrative concession to commercially operate the bridge-shuttle, popularly known as the Puente Colgante (Hanging Bridge) and officially the Puente Vizcaya (Vizcaya Bridge) between the Vizcaya towns of Portugalete and Getxo, situated on opposite banks at the mouth of the Nervión river
The company was constituted on 21 December 1995 on the call and subsequent award of the corresponding public tender, and has since then operated the shuttle service between both sides of the river without interruption, which is currently its main source of revenue.
In recent years, the company – without reducing the service and optimising the transport, which is the reason behind the Hanging Bridge— has also known how to innovate by diversifying its activities and boosting the tourism aspects (tours, merchandising, etc.) linked in part to the Bridge’s attraction as a unique piece of engineering and, on the other hand, its conditions as a World Heritage Site declared by UNESCO in 2006.
When the company took over the concession in 1995 it was aware of the need to make significant investment in order to renovate and update both the Bridge’s structural aspects (replacing the gondola) and the operating systems (opening and closing, berthing, speed, air-conditioning, access controls), and as regards its functionality. Hence, without failing to comply with the original essential mission of a shuttle, it is also a touristic attraction which can be commercially operated (opening the pedestrian walkway).
