Cinquantenaire

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Parc du Cinquantenaire (French) Jubelpark (Dutch)

Type	Pedestrian square and museum
Location	Brussels, Belgium
Coordinates	50°50′26″N 4°23′34″E / 50.84056, 4.39278
Opened	1880

Parc du Cinquantenaire (French), Jubelpark (Dutch) or Jubilee Park (English) is an urban public park with a complex of buildings in the eastern part of the European District of Brussels, Belgium.

The park is dominated by the 1880 triumphal arch in the middle, and the horse-shoe shaped buildings surrounding the park esplanade.

The N3 main road and line 1 of the Brussels Metro pass underneath and partly underneath an open- section in the middle of the park. The nearest metro stations are Schuman, to the west of the park, and Merode, immediately to the east. Under a new plan for refurbishing the complex however, the motorway will be closed, and a new car park will be built under the park, and a new metro station called Cinquantenaire will be built close by.^[1]

1 Residents and usages
2 History
3 Future
4 See also
5 References
6 External links

[edit] Residents and usages

A maquette of the western part of the complex

Today the various buildings of the Cinquantenaire host the Royal Museums for Art and History, the Royal Army and Military History Museum and the Autoworld automobile museum. In the summer, the esplande park is used for diverse purposes, such as military parades and drive-in movies.^{[citation needed]} It is also the starting point of the annual 20 km of Brussels, a run with 25,000 participants, is started in the park.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] History


The Cinquantenaire Arch		Park complex in front of the Arch. In the plans mentioned below, the underpass motorway would be closed.

Originally it was part of the military exercising ground outside of the center of the city, the so-called "Linthout" plains. For the world exhibition of 1880, the plain was converted to an exhibition center. The original pavillons of the exhibition have now mainly been replaced with the Arch and the large halls on both sides of the arch, leaving only the glass constructed Bordiau halls as a memento of 1880.

The Arch was planned for the world exhibition of 1880 and was meant to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the independence of Belgium. In 1880, only the bases of the columns had been constructed and during the exhibition the rest of the arch was completed with wooden panels. During the following years, the completion of the monument was the topic of a continuous battle between king Leopold II and the Belgian government, who did not want to spend so much money on it. The monument was finally completed by way of private funding in 1905, just in time for the 75th anniversary of the Belgian independence. It is the widest and second highest (after Paris) triumphal arch in the world.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Future

Further information: Brussels and the European Union#Future

Cinquantenaire is envisioned to possibly host the European Council, and the North Hall (pictured) would be a place for major congresses.

In September 2007, the European Commissioner for Administrative Affairs Siim Kallas, together with Minister-President of the Brussels-Capital Region Charles Picqué, unveiled plans for rebuilding the European district.^[2] They included 'Europeanising' part of the Cinquantenaire complex, and installing a major "socio-cultural facility" in the North Hall, enabled to hold "major congresses and, perhaps, European Summits, events, exhibitions" in the North Hall of the Cinquantenaire, after moving the Aerospace Museum out to Tour et Taxis in the north of the city. The Cinquantenaire would under the plans make become one of three European pedestrian squares, being the one for events and festivities.^[3]

Wider development surrounding the complex involves a new metro station called Cinquantenaire, an underground car park and the Europeanisation of part of the Cinquantenaire complex with a "socio-cultural facility". It is possible that the European Council may have to move to this area from Résidence Palace for security reasons.^[1]