TrnskoThe estate that was first called Novi Zagreb

Trnsko at a glance

• To the main square by ZET37 min
• To the centre as the crow flies4.6 km
• Residents (2021)⁵4,555
• Housing built^4,141960–1966

Where Trnsko is

Trnsko is an estate in Novi Zagreb, south of the Sava, on a triangle between the Zagreb – Sisak railway, Avenija Dubrovnik and Park mladenaca.^2,1 Officially it belongs to the city district of Novi Zagreb – zapad (west), and one local committee (mjesni odbor), 16. Mjesni odbor Trnsko, based at Trnsko 34a, covers all of it.^5,6 A neighbourhood (kvart) is an everyday name with no official boundary, so this guide describes Trnsko through that committee. Its boundary runs along the south side of Avenija Dubrovnik from the railway to building Trnsko 2, then takes in the buildings of the street Trnsko as far as the railway.⁶

West, across the railway, is Trokut, which shares Trnsko's primary school; east, beyond Park mladenaca, is Siget.^1,2,22 Wikipedia also lists Savski gaj and Kajzerica as neighbours.¹

For and against: life in Trnsko

What life is like in Trnsko

Trnsko was the first Novi Zagreb estate designed and built as a whole. Remetinečki gaj and Savski gaj are older, but they grew up next to existing villages.^2,12,14 It was planned by Zdenko Kolacio, Mirko Maretić and Josip Uhlik, and according to Maretić they followed Le Corbusier's principle of as much air and greenery as possible.^13,12

The builders put up 32 long blocks, most with a ground floor and four storeys above, and seven towers: six of 13 floors and one of 16.^14,2 The blocks are standard prefabricated and part-prefabricated buildings, most of them the "Bartolić" type, named after the architect Ivo Bartolić.^14,1 Because the groundwater is high, the planners avoided basements.¹⁴ The buildings have their addresses on a street of the same name, Trnsko.^6,8

Of the 29 hectares in the original plan, buildings took 16%, roads and parking 20% and green space 64%.¹⁴ The plan provided 24 playgrounds for children under three, ten for ages three to seven and one of about a hectare for ages seven to fifteen.¹⁴ At first there was no greenery; today the trees grow taller than the blocks.² For that reason Zrinka Barišić Marenić counts Trnsko among the most humane estates in Novi Zagreb.¹² A café and restaurant in front of Nama and a community hall were planned but never built, so the central space never became the meeting place the planners had in mind.^12,9,14

The estate was planned for about 10,000 people.^2,13,14 According to Klemenčić, who moved to Trnsko in autumn 1961 aged four, the newcomers were mostly young families from all over Croatia and the other Yugoslav republics, most of them in their first flat of their own.^4,2,3 Few were factory workers; many were clerks, technicians, engineers, teachers, journalists, officers and artists.^2,3 In 2020 Klemenčić wrote that about 5,000 people lived there, barely half the old number, and that pensioners were the largest group.² The 2021 census counted 4,555 residents in the committee area, about 15% fewer than in 2011, when 5,331 people lived in 2,923 dwellings.^5,7

Where the name Trnsko comes from

Trnsko is an old local place name: both accounts of how the names were chosen say the new South Zagreb estates took their names from old maps and plans.^12,15 The accounts differ on who proposed them. The planner Mirko Maretić recalled that Zdenko Kolacio asked the poet Gustav Krklec, who put forward 24 names, all of them accepted.^12,49 Ivo Maroević credits the architect Ivo Zemljak, who proposed names from old cadastral plans, among them Trnsko, Siget, Sopot, Utrine and Zapruđe, so that the names would keep a memory of the ground.¹⁵

What the name first meant is unconfirmed. Wikipedia and the property site Bauštela say an arm of the Sava called Ternsko ran here in the 19th century, from Remetinec to near today's Bundek, but they cite no historical source.^1,49 The first generation of residents call themselves Trnskaši, while a 2026 Jutarnji list report uses Trščani.^2,3,26

A short history of Trnsko

Before the estate there were empty meadows south of the Sava with a few family houses.^2,1 An aerial photo from 1958 already shows the railway branch to the Zagreb Fair crossing the future Trnsko.^17,3 The plan "Mikrorajon Novi Zagreb I i II" was drawn up in 1959 and 1960 at the Zagreb Urban Planning Institute, before the overall plan for South Zagreb of 1962; Mira Halambek-Wenzler designed the landscaping.^13,14,12 On 9 March 1960 the People's Committee of the City of Zagreb decided to start building, and that day is taken as Trnsko's beginning.^2,1

The first residents moved in at the end of 1961.^2,4 Many of the families already living here in the few single-storey houses were given replacement flats on the estate, and as late as 1963 a horse and cart was still moving new tenants in.^17,24

The school was founded in March 1963 and first used ground-floor rooms in buildings 37 and 38; pupils moved into the new building on 15 February 1964, before it was finished.¹⁹ The same year the plan was revised and the estate renamed Stambena zajednica Trnsko (the Trnsko residential community).^14,3 The housing was finished by 1966, when the Nama department store opened, and the supporting buildings by 1969.^4,9

Trnsko got its own parish in 1969, but at the end of 1971 it was merged into the Holy Cross parish, whose church is in Siget.²³ In 1975 the football club NK Trnsko '75, today's NK Hrvatski dragovoljac, was founded.^46,47 Trams have run along Avenija Dubrovnik since 29 November 1985.³³ The underpass beneath the railway to Trokut opened in 2006, and in October 2025 work began on Park mladenaca's first renovation in almost six decades.^39,25

1. 1958The railway branch to the Fair already crosses the future Trnsko.^17,3
2. 1960On 9 March the People's Committee of the City of Zagreb decides to start building "mikrorajon Novi Zagreb I i II".^2,1
3. 1961The first residents move in at the end of the year.^2,4
4. 1963The school is founded; lessons are held on the ground floors of buildings 37 and 38.¹⁹
5. 1964Pupils move into the new school building, and the estate becomes Stambena zajednica Trnsko.^19,14
6. 1966The Nama department store opens on 25 February.^9,10
7. 1969The covered arcade of the shopping centre is built.⁹
8. 1975NK Trnsko '75, today's NK Hrvatski dragovoljac, is founded.^46,47
9. 1983Azra release the song "Nebo iznad Trnskog" (The sky over Trnsko) on the album Kad fazani lete.^1,48
10. 1985Trams start running along Avenija Dubrovnik.³³
11. 2006The underpass beneath the railway to Trokut opens.³⁹
12. 2010The City Museum opens its "Zagreb neighbourhoods" series with an exhibition about Trnsko.^18,2
13. 2016The space in front of Trnsko 29 is named Trg Ane Rukavine.^36,37
14. 2025The first renovation of Park mladenaca begins.²⁵

What to see in Trnsko

• Nama department store

  Aleksandar Dragomanović designed the store at Trnsko 29 in 1964 and 1965, and it opened on 25 February 1966.^9,10 A white upper floor seems to float above a glass ground floor, and metal louvres shade the south side. A pitched roof added in 1996 and later alterations changed its look.^9,10 It is a protected cultural property (Z-680), and the register counts it among the major works of Croatian functionalist architecture. In 1966 it won the annual Viktor Kovačić award.^11,10

• The central towers

  Slavko Jelinek's six residential towers of 1963–1965 are set at an angle to the grid of blocks so that the flats get open views.^12,16 With Borivoj Feldman's 16-floor tower at Trnsko 12 they mark the centre of the estate; an identical Feldman tower stands in Savski gaj.^12,1

• The shopping centre

  Dragomanović, Radovan Nikšić and Edo Šmidihen designed the shops and services at Trnsko 29–34. Šmidihen's covered arcade of shops was built in 1969, and its pedestrian street was modelled on the Lijnbaan in Rotterdam.^9,10,12

• Trg Ane Rukavine

  On 20 December 2016 the City Assembly named the space in front of Trnsko 29 after the journalist Ana Rukavina, whose 2006 letter "Želim život" (I want to live) started a drive for bone-marrow donors.^36,37,38 She spent most of her life in Trnsko, where she went to school and played handball.³⁸

• Park mladenaca

  The green belt between Trnsko and Siget; the name means Newlyweds' Park. Following an idea of the architect Smiljan Klaić, couples planted a tree there after their wedding and wrote their names in a book kept in the park.^20,25 The school and HRT date the first tree to 1964, Jutarnji list to 1967. HRT counts about 8,000 trees, mostly birches, planted from 1967 to 1978; Jutarnji says 18,000 over 14 years.^20,25,26 In 1974 Stipe Sikirica's sculpture "Mladenci" (The Newlyweds) was put up, showing a young man carrying off his bride on horseback.^24,20

• The underpass mural

  A pedestrian and cycle underpass beneath the railway to Trokut, opened in 2006.³⁹ In September 2024 the mural "Sjećanja na Trnsko" (Memories of Trnsko) by Grupa ZID (Gregor Furkes, Leonard Lesić and Krešimir Golubić) was unveiled there, with old photographs, legendary bands, the Zagreb clock and athletes linked to the estate.⁴¹

Did you know?

• 1According to Klemenčić, during the spring and autumn Zagreb Fairs some residents worked at the Fair and others let rooms to visitors, so Trnsko had its own tourist office.³
• 2The school's house rules of 1965 banned long hair for boys.¹⁹
• 3When pupils moved into the new school in 1964, Trnsko had, according to the school, one telephone, one road and one shop.¹⁹
• 4During the spring 2020 lockdown three friends played music every Saturday from the roof of the tower at Trnsko 26 while neighbours danced on their balconies. They called the parties "Nebo iznad Trnskog", after the Azra song and an older neighbourhood event of the same name.⁴⁵

Everyday life in Trnsko

Renting in Trnsko

Nearby neighbourhoods

• SigetNeighbourhood guide
• Savski gajNeighbourhood guide
• New ZagrebNeighbourhood guide
• KajzericaNeighbourhood guide
• LaništeNeighbourhood guide
• Sveta KlaraNeighbourhood 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 Trnsko