Plaza de la República Dominicana

The name honors the Dominican Republic, the Caribbean state that shares the island of Hispaniola with Haiti, the same island Columbus reached in 1492 and where Santo Domingo, the first capital of the New World, was built. The square belongs to a set of streets in this part of Chamartín named after republics and cities of Spanish America: a few steps away run Costa Rica, Bolivia, Nicaragua, and the nearby plaza del Perú. The neighborhood is called Nueva España, the name of the viceroyalty that governed Mexico from the sixteenth century. The square holds a wound. On the morning of July 14, 1986, a van packed with explosives blew up as a bus passed carrying young Civil Guards, nearly all between eighteen and twenty-five, toward motorcycle training. Twelve died and dozens were wounded. The vehicle followed the same route at the same hour every day. On the spot, a sculpture remembers the victims of terrorism.