Gašparović, Sanja

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 Book review242 PROSTOR 2[62] 29[2021]    The book “Rijeka within the Reach of the City - Urban Ideas about the Sava in Zagreb” by Irena Matković, Ph.D., deals with the rela-tionship between the city and the Sava River - one of the most important urban issues in Zagreb in the 20th century. From the begin-ning of river regulations until today, in nu-merous urban competitions, plans, studies, analyses and projects, urban planners have been permanently preoccupied with rethink-ing the city - river relationship and the devel-opment concepts for its littoral. The incom-pleteness of the research of the proposals for the development the Sava area, their insuffi-cient professional and scientific processing, as well as evaluation in the context of spatial and urban planning, were the main stimuli of the author's research. It refers to reflections on the area of the Sava River and its banks in the period from 1889 to 2017, within the ad-ministrative boundaries of the City of Zagreb, which stretches along 30 km of river flow.Most of the book brings the findings of com-prehensive scientific research conducted during 2010 and 2011 at the Faculty of Archi-tecture in Zagreb1, subsequently supple-mented by the most important studies and projects for the period until 2017. Based on the available written, cartographic and graph-ic material, professional literature and press, the historical development of Zagreb on the Sava bank was investigated, with special ref-erence to regulatory works that enabled the settlement of the Sava lowland, construction of bridges over the Sava in Zagreb and his-torical reflections on navigability and the construction of the port. The author points to Sanja GašparovićRijeka Within the Reach of the CityUrban Ideas about the Sava in ZagrebRijeka nadohvat gradaUrbanističke ideje o Savi u ZagrebuIrena MatkovićPublishers: UPI-2M Plus, and the Faculty of Architecture, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, 2021220 pages, Croatian, Summary in English[26´21 cm, colour, paperback]Reviewers: Mladen Obad Šćitaroci, Sanja GašparovićEditor in chief: Ariana ŠtulhoferDesign: Saša StubičarISBN 978-953-7703-64-6CIP 001095301 [NSK Zagreb]constant changes in the professional concep-tion of the Zagreb Sava area, analyses the relationship of previous proposals to urban fabric, architecture, traffic and landscape, and thus creates a basis for future evalua-tions and planning of the development of Za-greb on the Sava banks.The book is richly illustrated, contains 220 pages and 16 chapters, and can be divided into two basic parts. In the first part, the au-thor introduces us to the historical develop-ment of Zagreb in the coastal area, natural features and water management basics. Based on the records of numerous proposals for design and development of the river area, it compares proposals and connects them with the time and social context, analysing them in several categories: proposals for de-sign and use of inundation belts, proposals for the Sava coast, landscape features of the pro-posed solutions, recreational aspects of coastal use. Instead of the conclusion of the first part of the book, Irena Matković singles out the challenges of arranging the Sava in Za-greb and makes recommendations for future procedural and formal-legal regulations of the Sava coastal planning process in Zagreb.A special contribution is the second part of the book, which occupies more than half of its volume, in the form of a catalogue of chrono-logically arranged proposals for the arrange-ment of the Sava River and the coast. The pro-posals are classified into categories accord-ing to the type and degree of elaboration: strategic spatial planning documents, spatial planning implementation documents, urban, urban-architectural or architectural projects, tender works, conceptual studies / expertise and ideas / directions. The proposals record-ed in the overview table are placed in the con-text of significant events and / or documents related to the Sava River in Zagreb. Each of the 117 catalogued proposals were classified into an appropriate category, elaborated with a graphic presentation and a brief descrip-tion, authors and sources and literature. In this way, the catalogue provides an insight into various ideas on arranging the banks of the Sava or its part in Zagreb, and together with an exhaustive list of literature and repre-sented authors, the catalogue contributes to the knowledge about the urban issue of the Sava in Zagreb as a whole and on the experts who worked on them in the span of 110 years.The book is intended primarily for experts, scholars and students in the field of archi-tecture, urbanism, spatial planning and land-scape architecture, but also for the gene- ral public as a source of relevant data on the  reflections of the Sava and the city over 110 years - from the first decision on the river regulations in 1899, questioning newly planned interventions. It is particularly im-portant in the context of ongoing doubts and the absence of an interdisciplinary consen-sus on the most acceptable scenario for the future development of the city along the riv-er. Therefore, it represents a significant con-tribution to the establishment of the neces-sary transdisciplinary approach that should ensure the sustainable coexistence of the city and the river in the future, with respect to the ecological-landscape and urban values of this sensitive interrelationship.1 The master’s thesis “Proposals for Arranging the Sava River with the Coast in the Area of Zagreb from 1899 to 2010, Urban, Architectural, Landscape and Hydrotech-nical Features” was prepared under the mentorship of academician Mladen Obad Šćitaroci and defended at the Faculty of Architecture, University of Zagreb in May 2011. The research was created as a part of the research project “Urban and Landscape Heritage of Croatia as part of Euro-pean Culture, led by prof.dr.sc. Mladen Obad Šćitaroci, which was implemented with the support of the Ministry of Science, Education and Sports of the Republic of Croa-tia in the period 2007-2013.

Rijeka Within the Reach of the City Urban Ideas about the Sava in Zagreb (Irena Matković)

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