Any consideration of the material heritage left on the streets of Europe by totalitarian regimes must include an element of anxiety. Attempting to evaluate the architectural and urban legacy of dictatorial regimes involves concerns about the relations between present-day democratic Europe and its emergence out of a non-democratic past, whether of Fascist or Nazi regimes, or of the soviet or soviet-influenced regimes of eastern Europe. This article narrates the experience of the European cultural route ATRIUM and the ways in which it has confronted these anxieties with the active involvement not only of historians and politicians, but also of citizens, local cultural associations, cultural industries and tourists. It is argued that the experience may represent an example of a way in which Europeans can develop a common democratic perception of their history and share the experience of coming to terms with the contradictions of living in urban spaces constructed during totalitarian regimes.