A palace built on a demolished neighborhood
The Palace of the Parliament stands at Strada Izvor 2-4 in Bucharest, on Arsenal Hill. It was commissioned by Nicolae Ceaușescu, with the groundbreaking on 25 June 1984 and construction running through 1997. The chief architect was Anca Petrescu, who supervised about 700 architects.
It has a floor area of 365,000 m², a volume of 2,550,000 m³, 12 floors above ground and eight underground levels, and about 1,100 rooms. It weighs about 4,098,500 tonnes, which makes it the heaviest building in the world.
The cost was about €4 billion as of 2020. About 7 km² of the old city center was demolished and about 40,000 people were relocated. Official data reports 27 deaths during construction, though workers have claimed far higher numbers.
Today it houses the Chamber of Deputies, the Senate and the Constitutional Court, as well as the National Museum of Contemporary Art and a conference center. About 70 percent of the building remains empty.
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