Despite tremendous obstacles, efforts to rebuild lives and restore
the city continued. Encouragement came from overseas and from elsewhere
in Japan.
In 1949, a major step was taken with the passage of the "Hiroshima
Peace Memorial City Reconstruction Law". Peace Boulevard, commonly known
as One Hundred-Meter Boulevard, was one of the city's great triumphs. Out
of the scorched rubble emerged a spacious thoroughfare for cars and pedestrians
that include greenbelts and thousands of donated trees.
The boulevard was constructed along the path of an east-west fire
lane made during the war, but a number of residents still had to be relocated
to the land substituted. The foresight involved in conceiving and implementing
this plan came to symbolize Hiroshima's rebirth.
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