housing was still being built in Bucharest, without any legal documentation.
The urban principles of the new systematization are briefly expressed in the
decision^10 :
- an increase in population to 1.500.000-1.700.000 inhabitants and
subsequent territorial limits; - the preservation of the radial-annular circulation system, with
improvements of boulevards and representative squares (in the
case of the new monumental buildings, classical, national and soviet
examples are pointed out as inspiration); - the introduction of the metro lines;
- the channeling and navigability of the Dâmbovița river by connecting
it to the Bucharest-Danube channel and by creating a wider river-
bed and a reservoir at Ciurel; - a rather ludicrous idea of constructing a fluvial port on Dâmbovița
for passengers; - monumental entrances to the city on the main roads and railroads;
- building housing on surfaces of 5-10ha., organized in cvartals;
- introducing the complex ensemble as the main rule of urban
development; the ensembles were to be completely equipped, with
a maximum density of 300 inhabitants/ha. and a maximum built
area of 25-30% of the surface; - a maximum height of the buildings expressed this time in floors,
rather than meters and limited in general to 6 floors. On main
boulevards the buildings could be 8-10 floors and in the periphery
they could decrease to 4 floors. Individual buildings with one or two
floors were restricted to the inner areas of the housing ensembles,
so as not to affect the new image of the city; - the limitation and relocation towards the periphery of most
industrial areas; erasing the difference between the city center and
its periphery by establishing cultural amenities and equipment in all
housing ensembles; the preservation of existing architectural and
natural monuments; - the preservation of the existing parks and the establishment of new
ones; - other less important provisions for our subject.^11
Though this decision represents a legal framework for new systematization
plans for 100 towns in Romania and there was a deadline imposed for a new
plan for the capital in 1953, the plan for Bucharest was not elaborated until
- In fact only the systematization plan for Galați was approved in this
interval. The effect of the lack of systematization was a reduced scale of the
interventions at this time and their territorial limitation.
The architectural style promoted and basically enforced was socialist
realism with a strong ban on modernism, functionalism or rationalism or any
architectural manifestation connected to “cosmopolitism”. When planning
Bucharest’s urban planning instruments during the communist regime:
systematization sketches, plans, projects and interventions