PrečkoFrom a village by the Sava to an estate of composers' streets

Prečko at a glance

• To the main square by ZET41 min
• To the centre as the crow flies6.4 km
• Residents, MO Prečko (2021)³13,795
• Mostly built^53,211970s and 1980s

Where Prečko is

North of Prečko, across Zagrebačka avenija, lies Špansko; to the east are Vrbani and, further on, Jarun; to the west Savska Opatovina and Jankomir; and to the south the Sava.^6,1 Officially it belongs to the city district of Trešnjevka – jug, where Mjesni odbor Prečko is one of six local committees (mjesni odbori).^4,5 For statistics it is part of the settlement of Zagreb; it was a separate village until 1950.^5,9 Neighbourhoods have no official boundaries, and the committee's boundary is wider than the estate itself: it also takes in the streets Mlake and Vrbje and follows Aleja Matije Ljubeka down to the Sava.⁵

According to the local-history site Nepoznati Zagreb and the Mapiranje Trešnjevke project, both by the same author, Vanja Radovanović, Prečko's northern edge was fixed by the Autoput, the motorway that is now Zagrebačka avenija, built in the middle of the 20th century. The land north of the road, with the Prečko barracks, gradually stopped being thought of as Prečko.^22,20

For and against: life in Prečko

What life is like in Prečko

Prečko is a socialist-era housing estate, which Anamaria Klasić's 2025 doctoral thesis describes as a mix of blocks of different heights and building styles, with pockets of family houses.⁵³ The main road is Ulica Ivana Matetića Ronjgova, the continuation of Horvaćanska cesta.⁶ Much of the estate was built by the Zagreb construction firm Vladimir Gortan, founded in 1952; the City's 2023 competition brief says it put up most of the buildings.^6,10

Significant building began in the 1960s with blocks along Lhotkina and Dobronićeva.^6,53 According to Mapiranje Trešnjevke and Nepoznati Zagreb, the first blocks on Lhotkina, Dobronićeva and Ulica Josipa Slavenskog were meant for students, but after the great Sava flood of 1964 they went mainly to families hit by the flood.^21,22 Later building followed the Prečko detailed plan (Provedbeni urbanistički plan Prečko), adopted in December 1973.^6,7 The 2025 thesis says the estate was built intensively in the late 1970s under the socially directed housing programme.⁵³ According to Mapiranje Trešnjevke, Prečko then became one big building site, from Štefanićeva, Sibeliusova and Odakova in the east to Paljetkova and Baranovićeva in the west.²¹ Nepoznati Zagreb adds that most of the remaining blocks were up by the mid-1980s.²² The block at Beethovenova 1 was designed in the 1970s by the architects Tomislav Odak and Vesna Cimaš.^11,12

The estate's streets are named after composers and musicians, from Beethovenova and Sibeliusova to Jarnovićeva, Hatzeova and Tijardovićeva.^6,21,42,50 According to Nepoznati Zagreb, the practice began with the first streets of the 1960s, Slavenskoga, Lhotkina and Dobronićeva, and has continued ever since.²²

The old village lives on in roads, street names and a few houses. According to Mapiranje Trešnjevke and Nepoznati Zagreb, the oldest roads are Ulica Prečko, which ran through the former village centre, Petrovaradinska cesta (called Novosadska until 1992), and Svilkovići and Špansko towards Špansko.^20,22,28 According to Nepoznati Zagreb, the side streets Dekanići, Tucmani and Vunarići carry the surnames of old local families.²² Mapiranje Trešnjevke's photos from 2013–2015 show the oldest house in Prečko, a house on Tucmani with its stable and barn, and terraced houses on Jarnovićeva.²⁰

In the 2025 thesis a long-time resident recalls that flats here were mostly allocated in Yugoslav times, that the first residents were mainly working people, and that the population began to mix after the tram arrived. Today, he says, many flats in his entrance have subtenantsSubletting (podnajam)simplifiedWhen the tenant lets the flat, or part of it, to someone else. They need the landlord's consent; subletting without it is a ground for notice.Source: Zakon o najmu stanova (NN 91/96 … 105/20), čl. 19. i 28., checked 19 Oct 2026More in the glossary.⁵³ Participants in the same study say that as property prices rise, new residents are moving in, among them young families with children.⁵³ Mapiranje Trešnjevke writes that Prečko is generally considered a pleasant place to live, for the green space and playgrounds the plan left between the blocks and for nearby Jarun and the Sava embankment.²⁰

Where the name Prečko comes from

The name is explained by the place's position on the Sava. The City's 2023 competition brief says Prečko was one of the hamlets along the river's side channels, opposite the village of Lučko, which explains the name, and that a Sava crossing was nearby.⁶ The historian Kristian Strukić of the Museum of the City of Zagreb writes that the village was named after its estates and meadows across the Sava, beside which it lay.⁹ Both explanations tie the name to the word preko, "across".^6,9

Strukić, citing the Zagrebački leksikon, adds that the place also appears in sources as Novo Špansko, "New Špansko".⁹ The parish was founded under that name in 1966 and has been called Prečko since 1975, when the Špansko parish split off from it.^16,17

A short history of Prečko

Prečko's earliest mention is not settled. Strukić says it appears in sources from the 17th century, and the City says the villages of Prečko, Horvati and Jarun are mentioned from the mid-18th century.^9,2 The first houses, around today's Ulica Prečko, are marked on the maps of the Habsburg First Military Survey of 1764–1784.⁶ According to Glas Trešnjevke and Nepoznati Zagreb, before the First World War there was a military training ground along today's Petrovaradinska cesta, and the Prečko barracks stood a little further north.^28,22

In 1945 the Yugoslav Army ran a prisoner camp at Prečko.^29,1 According to a dispatch from its headquarters, it held 15,000 prisoners on 15 May 1945; after the amnesty in August, 772 were released and 77 remained.^29,1 According to Kristian Strukić, the village had 371 inhabitants at the 1948 census and became part of the city in 1950.⁹ From 1952 it belonged to the municipality of Vrapče, from 1955 to Susedgrad, seven years later to Črnomerec, and from 1974 to the municipality of Trešnjevka, until Zagreb's municipalities were abolished on 31 December 1990.^2,1

In the 1960s Prečko had about 3,500 people and no school of its own, so children went to school in Špansko.^13,9 A prefabricated school opened on 10 October 1966, and the new OŠ Prečko building opened on 2 November 1970 with 735 pupils.¹³ The parish was founded on 20 August 1966, and on 4 September the auxiliary bishop Franjo Kuharić and the first parish priest, the Jesuit Adam Periškić, opened it in Nikola Matošić's house, which Kuharić called "God's tent by the motorway".^16,17 The Holy Trinity church was blessed on 13 June 1976, and the same year OŠ Prečko-Zapad, today's OŠ Nikole Tesle, opened and took pupils off the overcrowded OŠ Prečko.^16,17,15,13

In April 1992 OŠ Prečko took in 93 displaced and refugee pupils.¹³ The Shopping centar Prečko, one of the first shopping centres in Zagreb, opened in 1995.^41,26 Work on the tram line began on 23 December 1999, and on 20 November 2000 tram 17 reached Prečko for the first time, on a new 2,800-metre line with five new stops.^30,31,32 At the opening ZET's director said residents had been waiting for the tram since 1987, when it came only as far as the Jarun loop.³¹ A few years later line 5 was extended to Prečko as well.^23,32

In February 2025 the City announced the winners of the competition for a new nursery on Jarnovićeva, and in October 2026 it published the project to extend OŠ Prečko.^55,56 According to Jutarnji list, in January 2026 the investor Allegheny Financial presented plans for a new neighbourhood with a nursery and a school on the empty land of Savska Opatovina behind the Prečko tram terminus.⁵⁷

1. 1764–1784The first houses around today's Ulica Prečko are marked on the First Military Survey maps.⁶
2. 1945The Yugoslav Army runs a prisoner camp at Prečko.^29,1
3. 1950The village, which had 371 inhabitants in 1948, becomes part of the city.⁹
4. 1964–1965After the Sava flood, families hit by it move into the first blocks.^21,22
5. 1966The parish is founded and a prefabricated school opens.^16,13
6. 1970The new OŠ Prečko building opens.¹³
7. 1973The Prečko detailed plan is adopted.^6,7
8. 1976The Holy Trinity church is blessed, and today's OŠ Nikole Tesle opens.^16,17,15
9. 1979The first Kocka tournament is played, with eight teams.^49,48
10. 1995The Shopping centar Prečko opens.^41,26
11. 2000Tram 17 reaches Prečko for the first time.^31,32
12. 2013The EkoEkipa Prečko community garden opens.²⁵
13. 2016Park Emila Cossetta is named.⁵¹
14. 2026The City publishes the project to extend OŠ Prečko.⁵⁶

What to see in Prečko

• Church of the Holy Trinity

  At Prečko 50. It was built in 1975 and 1976, and Archbishop Franjo Kuharić blessed it on 13 June 1976.^17,16 In 1998 the parish built a chapel for the victims of the Way of the Cross (Križni put) and the Prečko camp, and a Lourdes grotto in the churchyard.¹⁶ The earthquake of 29 December 2020 cracked the church walls and the Stations of the Cross in the churchyard.¹⁷

• OŠ Nikole Tesle

  The 1976 school is four hexagonal concrete towers: two of classrooms, one for after-school care and one with the big sports hall. The young architects Radovan Tajder and Nenad Paulić designed it and Jugodidacta built it. Because the school leaked, work on a pitched roof began in April 1988.¹⁵

• The Kocka pitch

  According to Croatian Wikipedia, the small-sided football pitch called Kocka on Tijardovićeva hosts the charity tournament of the same name, started in 1979.^1,48,49 According to the organisers, the first drew eight teams and the biggest, in 1985, drew 127; the 45th edition was played in 2025.⁴⁹ In April 2026 a mural of the former Dinamo players Branko Strupar and Borna Sosa appeared in Prečko, calling Strupar "the legend of Kocka" and Sosa "the pride of Prečko".⁵⁴

• Tržnica Prečko

  Ulica Josipa Hatzea 1, with an indoor section of stalls.⁴² According to Nepoznati Zagreb, it was built in 1980 at the former village centre, by the wayside cross and the old health post.^22,53

• Park Emila Cossetta

  Named on 8 September 2016 after the composer and choirmaster Emil Cossetto, a former president of the Croatian Composers' Society.⁵¹

• EkoEkipa Prečko community garden

  On Jarnovićeva, opposite the OŠ Nikole Tesle playground. Residents turned a neglected city plot into a garden that opened on 9 June 2013, and by November that year more than 70 people were working about 50 beds.²⁵ The garden is still active; in September 2026 it hosted free workshops for older residents.⁵²

• Shopping centar Prečko

  Opened in 1995.^41,26 According to Mapiranje Trešnjevke, bus 114 terminates beside it on Ulica Josipa Slavenskog, and a 2008 extension holds two covered five-a-side pitches.^24,26

• The former CAOP building

  On Paljetkova. The former data processing centre (Centar za automatsku obradu podataka) is now the APIS IT agency.^6,22

Did you know?

• 1Mapiranje Trešnjevke records a local saying that calls Prečko "a suburb of Ljubljana", because it is the last city estate to the west before the motorway to Ljubljana begins.²⁰
• 2According to Telegram in November 2020, the Prečko tram terminus stands on land of the Maršanić family, taken in Yugoslav times for a road that was never built; the family went to court in 1997 and won a final ruling that the City must return the land.³³
• 3The first Kocka tournament in 1979 was played with small goals. According to the organisers, the next year's full-size goals were made from scaffolding "borrowed" from building sites in Špansko.⁴⁹
• 4The 1973 plan also provided for air-raid shelters. One is built into a mound with playground slides on the Jarnovićeva nursery plot, and the City keeps it in the plan for the new nursery.^6,7
• 5According to Mapiranje Trešnjevke and Nepoznati Zagreb, before the estate was built the only bus through Prečko was line 28, from Remiza along the Autoput to Savska Opatovina.^21,22

Everyday life in Prečko

Renting in Prečko

Nearby neighbourhoods

• ŠpanskoNeighbourhood guide
• VrbaniNeighbourhood guide
• MalešnicaNeighbourhood guide
• RudešNeighbourhood guide
• StaglišćeNeighbourhood guide
• StenjevecNeighbourhood guide

• Compare districts: Trešnjevka – South and New Zagreb – West
• Compare districts: Trešnjevka – South and Stenjevec
• Compare districts: Trešnjevka – South and Trešnjevka – North
• All Zagreb neighbourhood guides

Questions about life in Prečko