BotinecHouses built after the 1964 flood, streets named after Croatian literature

Botinec at a glance

• To the main square by ZET46 min
• To the centre as the crow flies7.3 km
• Residents, Botinec local committee (2021)²3,989
• Most houses^4,5from the 1960s

Where Botinec is

Botinec is in the south-west of Novi Zagreb, in the city district of Novi Zagreb – zapad. It is covered by the Botinec local committee (mjesni odbor), one of the district's 16, based at Ulica Bašćanske ploče 5.^2,3,1 The committee area takes in the statistical settlement of Botinec and parts of the settlements of Brezovica, Odranski Obrež and Zagreb, and the built-up neighbourhood, with its literary street names and Trg botinečkih branitelja, is officially in the settlement of Zagreb.³ According to Croatian Wikipedia, the more densely settled northern part of the Botinec settlement was merged into the settlement of Zagreb in 1991, and the almost empty southern remnant had four residents at the 2021 census.⁴ Neighbourhoods have no official boundaries, so this guide describes Botinec through the committee area.

Remetinec lies to the north, and Blato to the west, across Brezovička cesta and the railway; the committee's boundary follows the east side of Brezovička cesta.³ In the east it follows the edges of the Blato, Klara and Čehi cadastral areas. In the south the committee area crosses the A3 (the Zagreb bypass) twice and reaches the Odra relief canal and the Brezovica district, but the houses are north of the motorway.^3,35,34,4

For and against: life in Botinec

What life is like in Botinec

In 2026 the site Bauštela described Botinec as a former suburban settlement known for its family houses, now getting more and more new apartment buildings.^31,30 The Botinec nursery describes its setting as "between tall buildings and small family houses and yards".¹² The older part is called Stari Botinec (Old Botinec), and the GUP lists it among the former villages on the city's edge.^4,34

Most of the neighbourhood, apart from Stari Botinec, went up after the 1964 flood.⁴ Families who had lost their homes were given one-, two- or three-room prefab houses, many of them in terracesBalcony and terrace (balkon, terasa)A balcony projects from the building's façade; a terrace is a level surface on or next to the building, covered or open. Both count only in part in floor-area figures.Source: Pravilnik o načinu obračuna površine i obujma u projektima zgrada (NN 90/10), čl. 4.–5., checked 19 Oct 2026More in the glossary.^5,14 A resident told the newspaper Vjesnik in 2004 that they were built to be lived in for six years at most. Residents later bought the land, and did up and extended their houses.⁵

At least one block of flats also went up as temporary housing after the flood, on Ulica Kolarove Breze: a ground floor and two upper floors of concrete blocks, with 33 flats that were home to about 50 people in 2015. Energy renovation began at the end of 2014, with 40% of the cost from the Environmental Protection and Energy Efficiency Fund, and lifted the building from energy classEnergy class (energetski razred)simplifiedA rating from A+ (best) to G (worst) on the energy certificate, based on the yearly energy needed for heating and the primary energy per m².Source: Pravilnik o energetskom pregledu zgrade i energetskom certificiranju (NN 88/17 … 40/25), čl. 17. i Prilog 1., checked 19 Oct 2026More in the glossary F to B.^7,8

According to an article in Vjesnik bibliotekara Hrvatske (2020), Botinec is the only neighbourhood in Zagreb where almost every street is named after characters from Croatian literature.^15,14 The official list includes Ulica Šegrta Hlapića, Šenoine Branke, Zlatarova zlata, Pere Kvržice, Dunda Maroja, Filipa Latinovicza and Velog Jože, and the square is Trg botinečkih branitelja.³ According to Croatian Wikipedia, about thirty streets carry literary names.⁴

The 2025 GUP classes Botinec as an area of individual house building, with a maximum above-ground floor-area ratio of 1.2. For the undeveloped western edge the plan requires a detailed plan, UPU Botinec – zapad, which must set aside land for health, school, preschool and cultural uses, a public park, and sport and recreation.³⁴

In November 2025 Jutarnji list estimated that the neighbourhood could gain more than a thousand new residents within a year or two.³⁰ Botinec Residence, with 70 flats on Botinec's south-eastern edge, was under construction from October 2024, and Bauštela reported it finished in August 2026.³¹ Botinec Living, with 60 flats, is going up next to the manor; according to Jutarnji list, construction began in June 2025 and completion is planned for the end of 2026.²⁹

The Botinec committee area had 4,413 residents and 1,805 dwellings at the 2011 census, and 3,989 residents at the 2021 census.^37,2 According to a 2025 interview on Tportal, the textile firm Naftalina, founded in 1983 by Josipa Maslać Petričević, employs about 70 people in eight halls in Botinec.³⁶

Where the name Botinec comes from

Botinec takes its name from the Boti family, counts who owned most of the land here.^1,4,14 According to Croatian Wikipedia, the village was also called Botinec Stupnički or Stupnički Botinec, and statistics listed it as Botinec Stupnički from 1910 to 1981.⁴

The name also lives on in Bc Institut, the plant-breeding company based here, whose B and C are the first and last letters of Botinec.²²

A short history of Botinec

According to a text by Željko Ivanjek quoted in Jutarnji list, on 4 June 1848, before his installation as ban, Josip Jelačić dined in Botinec, at Ambroz Vranyczany's country house, 45 minutes from town and to the left of the Karlovac road.^29,4,31

Bc Institut began plant breeding at Botinec in 1947; that year Dr Josip Potočanac started work on wheat there, and the institute's cereals department still develops new varieties on the site.^22,4 In 1947 and 1948 the architect Vladimir Turina, with Boltar, designed a civil airport at Botinec that was never built.²⁰ The City Planning Institute's partial plans of 1956–1962 counted Botinec among the settlements of simple construction.²¹

On the night of 25 to 26 October 1964 the Sava flooded almost a third of Zagreb, and 17 people died.^5,6 The City decided to build temporary housing for the flood victims, and the settlements of Novi Retkovec and Botinec grew out of it.^6,5,4,9 Before moving in, the families spent about a year in barracks at the Zagreb Fair (Velesajam).^5,4 Stjepan Topolko, whose flat in Rudeš had been flooded, came to Botinec early in 1967.⁵

The decision founding the primary school was issued on 29 September 1966, and its building opened on 14 June 1967. In its first year the school had 485 pupils, taught in three places: Botinec, Savski Gaj and Blato.⁹ The school describes Botinec as a workers' settlement that grew up after the flood, where for years the school was also the main centre of cultural and sports activities. A new building replaced the prefab school and opened on 8 September 1988.⁹ The parish of Zagreb – Botinec was founded on 7 October 1969, split off from the parish of Zagreb – Remetinec-Blato, and the nursery opened in 1972.^10,11,12

Until 1994 Botinec was one of 15 local communities in what is now the district, and in February 2009 the Botinec local committee was set up.^1,3 The same year Stari Botinec joined the parish, moving from the parish of Zagreb – Sveta Klara.¹⁰

In August 2025 residents protested against a new street, nine metres wide, that the draft GUP drew through private plots, houses and yards. Residents said it would cut through the nursery's yard and the volunteer fire brigade's garage, and two houses would have to be demolished; the City replied that the road was in keeping with the settlement.³² On 1 September 2025 the City Assembly's spatial-planning committee asked for a written answer on the road's purpose and who had proposed it.³³

1. 1848On 4 June Ban Jelačić dines at Ambroz Vranyczany's country house in Botinec.^29,4
2. 1947Bc Institut starts plant breeding at Botinec.^22,4
3. 1964On the night of 25 to 26 October the Sava floods almost a third of Zagreb.^5,6
4. 1967The primary school, founded in 1966, opens its building.⁹
5. 1969The parish of Zagreb – Botinec is founded.¹⁰
6. 1972The Botinec nursery opens.^11,12
7. 1979The football club NK Botinec is founded.²³
8. 1988The school moves from its prefab building into a new one.⁹
9. 1991The basketball club KK Botinec is founded; in 2005 it is renamed KK Cedevita.¹⁹
10. 2009The Botinec local committee is set up; Stari Botinec joins the parish.^1,3,10
11. 2014Energy renovation of the Kolarove Breze block begins.^7,8
12. 2025The amended GUP requires Botinec's street pattern to be preserved.³⁴
13. 2026Botinec Residence, with 70 flats, is finished.³¹

What to see in Botinec

• The Botinec manor

  The manor (kurija) with its park and chapel at Ulica dr. Luje Naletilića 84 is a protected cultural property (Z-3447).^34,35 Jutarnji list and Bauštela link it to Ambroz Vranyczany's country house, where Ban Jelačić dined in 1848.^29,31 In January 2026 Jutarnji list found it too derelict to enter, with the 19th-century chapel in front of it decaying; the last major works were an extension in the 1970s. The investor building next door had asked for the protection to be lifted, and the Croatian Council for Cultural Property refused.^29,30

• Church of St Stephen the First Martyr

  The parish church is fitted out in the basement of two joined family houses built in 1969. The parish office is at Ulica Pere Kvržice 15.¹⁰

• The Archaeological Museum's depot

  The Archaeological Museum in Zagreb keeps an outside depot at Ulica Šegrta Hlapića 2, for finds from field digs and for its publications. After the 2020 earthquake its study collections, mostly pottery fragments, were moved there.³⁸

Did you know?

• 1The basketball club KK Botinec was founded in Botinec in 1991. As KK Hiron Botinec it reached the top league in 2001, and after Atlantic Grupa took it over in 2005 it was renamed KK Cedevita.¹⁹
• 2On 1 December 2018 the association Lastin rep, with the Ethnographic Museum, Zagreb City Libraries and other partners, launched the "Knjige naših ulica" (Books of Our Streets) project in Botinec. Children's work called "100 lica Šegrta Hlapića" went on show in the bibliobus from 30 September 2019.^16,15
• 3On 9 May 2021 Margareta and Davor Peršić of Lastin rep led a Jane's Walk through Botinec, which the organisers described as one of Zagreb's southernmost neighbourhoods; 27 walkers came.¹⁸

Everyday life in Botinec

Renting in Botinec

Nearby neighbourhoods

• RemetinecNeighbourhood guide
• BlatoNeighbourhood guide
• Sveta KlaraNeighbourhood guide
• LaništeNeighbourhood guide
• Savski gajNeighbourhood guide
• TrnskoNeighbourhood guide

• Compare districts: New Zagreb – West and Brezovica
• Compare districts: New Zagreb – West and New Zagreb – East
• Compare districts: New Zagreb – West and Podsused – Vrapče
• All Zagreb neighbourhood guides

Questions about life in Botinec