The Ben Franklin Parkway is one of Philadelphia’s most recognizable places, and it got its inspiration from an avenue 4,000 miles away in France, write Jacqueline London and Kaleah Mcilwain for NBC 10 Philadelphia.

The boulevard is called Champs-Élysées.

While the inspiration was clear, it took decades to come to fruition.

During the 1890s, Philadelphians took part in the City Beautiful movement, which was in response to the accumulating dirt in industrial cities and the belief that better sanitation, parkways, civic art, and improved traffic circulation would make cities more profitable and harmonious.

After the Civil War, Philadelphia had just created Fairmount Park and was the largest industrial city in the nation.

“And there was an immediate, almost immediate clamor to try to figure out a way to better connect this city to the park,” said David Brownlee, a local architectural historian and author.

In 1907, what became a 10-year demolition process of 1600 buildings west of where the Rodin Museum stands today. The result was just an empty landscape.

It was 1917 that two French architects, Jacques Gréber and Paul Cret, collaborated and created what would be the inspiration for the Parkway.

The Parkway was completed in 1926 and helped transform the Philly as it was known at the time.

Read more about the story behind the Ben Franklin Parkway in NBC 10 Philadelphia.

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