Bulevardul Unirii is a major thoroughfare

Thoroughfare

A thoroughfare is a place of transportation intended to connect one location to another. Highways, roads, and trails are examples of thoroughfares used by a variety of general traffic. On land a thoroughfare may refer to anything from a rough trail to multi-lane highway with grade separated...

 in central Bucharest

Bucharest

Bucharest is the capital municipality, cultural, industrial, and financial centre of Romania. It is the largest city in Romania, located in the southeast of the country, at , and lies on the banks of the Dâmbovița River....

, Romania

Romania

Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...

. It connects Alba Iulia Square with Constitution Square

Piaţa Constituţiei

Piaţa Constituţiei , also known as Palace Square, is one of the largest squares in the downtown of Bucharest, Romania. The square is standing face-to-face with the Palace of the Parliament and it is bisected by the Bulevardul Unirii and by the Bulevardul Libertăţii...

, and also runs through Unification Square

Piata Unirii

Piața Unirii is one of the largest squares in central Bucharest, located in the center of the city where Sectors 1, 2, 3, and 4 meet. It is bisected by Unirii Boulevard, originally built during the Communist era as the Boulevard of the Victory of Socialism, and renamed after the Romanian...

. The Constitution Square end features the Palace of the Parliament

Palace of the Parliament

The Palace of the Parliament in Bucharest, Romania is a multi-purpose building containing both chambers of the Romanian Parliament. According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the Palace is the world's largest civilian administrative building, most expensive administrative building, and...

.

History

Following the 1977 Vrancea earthquake, Bucharest's city center suffered significant damage, and a large number of historic buildings were demolished to make way for the new Centrul Civic (Civic Center; see systematization and Ceauşima

Ceausima

Ceauşima is a vernacular word construction in Romanian, sarcastically linking former Communist leader Nicolae Ceauşescu to Hiroshima. This portmanteau term was sometimes coined in the 1980s to describe the huge urban areas of Bucharest that Ceauşescu ordered torn down, comparing the results with...

). As part of the project, Bulevardul Unirii was to be Communist Romania

Communist Romania

Communist Romania was the period in Romanian history when that country was a Soviet-aligned communist state in the Eastern Bloc, with the dominant role of Romanian Communist Party enshrined in its successive constitutions...

's answer to Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

's Avenue des Champs-Élysées, with a length of 3,500 m. Construction began on June 25, 1984. Initially called Bulevardul Victoria Socialismului (Victory of Socialism Boulevard), the road is lined with socialist-realist

Socialist realism

Socialist realism is a style of realistic art which was developed in the Soviet Union and became a dominant style in other communist countries. Socialist realism is a teleologically-oriented style having its purpose the furtherance of the goals of socialism and communism...

 apartment blocks of North Korea

North Korea

The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea , , is a country in East Asia, occupying the northern half of the Korean Peninsula. Its capital and largest city is Pyongyang. The Korean Demilitarized Zone serves as the buffer zone between North Korea and South Korea...

n inspiration.