Assour became Sahat Assour after the completion of the Damascus-Beirut highway in 1863. From initially hosting military parades and a cattle market, to the Capitole and Pan American buildings in the early 1950s, Sahat Assour bore outstanding witness to the modernization of the Beirut Central District, ultimately becoming Riad Al Solh Square when she was endowed with the statue of Riad Al-Solh in 1957.