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Raša

Arsia
Raša Arsia
Municipality
	Raša Municipality
	St. Barbara parish in Raša
	Flag Coat of arms
	Location of Raša in Istria
	Raša
	Coordinates: 45°05′N 14°05′E / 45.083°N 14.083°E
Country	Croatia
County	Istria County
Area
• Municipality	31.0 sq mi (80.4 km2)
• Urban	0.6 sq mi (1.5 km2)
Elevation	30 ft (10 m)
Population (2021)
• Municipality	2,809
• Density	90/sq mi (35/km2)
• Urban	1,184
• Urban density	2,000/sq mi (790/km2)
Time zone	UTC+1 (CET)
• Summer (DST)	UTC+2 (CEST)
Postal code	52223 Raša
Vehicle registration	PU
Municipality day	November 4
Patron saints	St. Barbara
Website	rasa.hr

Raša (Italian: Arsia, Chakavian: Aršija) is a small town and a municipality in Istria, Croatia. The town was created in the 1930s as a coal mining town under the Italian government.

Location

Raša stands in the south-eastern part of Istria peninsula, in the inner part of the Raška Inlet, 4.5 kilometres (2.8 mi) southwest of Labin. Its elevation is 10 m (33 ft). It was named after the eponym Raša river.^[3]

It is situated in the valley of the Krapanski Potok, a tributary of the river Raša. The former village of Krapan is just upstream, today dominated by a ceramics manufacture.^[4]

History

Before Raša

Local mining activity existed in the 17th century, during the period of Venetian administration. At that time, the place was called Krapan. During the 18th century, some forty miners were producing about 560 tons of coal per year. With the 19th century's global industrialization and especially the expansion of the steam engine, coal mines developed significantly. By the time of the Austrian administration, late 19th and early 20th century, approximately 1,500 workers were producing about 90,000 tons per year. Krapan had acquired numerous new facilities. The small church of St. Barabara (patroness of the miners) was built in 1905, shaped as an upturned coal wagon, with a bell tower looking like a miner's lamp and, on its facade, a stone embossed figure of St.Barbara by sculptor Ugo Carà from Trieste.^[5] It is a single nave church.
By 1936 under the Italian administration, production had increased to 735,610 tons of coal; it aimed for one million tons and about 7,000 employees. So the coal mine company (“Arsa” Società Anonima Carbonifera) and its successor A.Ca.I. (Azienda Carboni Italiani) decided to finance the construction of a suitable village.^[5]

Construction

The original name for the village was Liburnia; later, the name Arsia (Raša) prevailed after the eponymous river.^[5]

Raša was built as a "new town" during 1936-1937 as part of Mussolini's urban colonization of Istria. Planned and designed according to the rationalist principles by architect, Gustavo Pulitzer-Finali from Trieste, Italy, the mining town is organized along a linear axis connecting the Upper and Lower Raša. Lower Raša consists of houses for ordinary miners set along two parallel streets while Upper Raša is organized along three parallel streets with similar houses but slightly larger in size, designated for senior miners and supervisors. Smaller residential enclaves were organized throughout the elongated plan, one of which is "villette", a gated series of small urban villas designated for mining executives.

The town centre connecting the Lower and Upper Raša included a large square with hotels, post office, supermarket, movie theatre, pharmacy, administrative offices and small arcaded shops. Overlooking the square is the church of Santa Barbara (patron saint of miners). Centrally located are also the town hospital, football field, bocci terrain and swimming pool with diving tower and bowling alley.

More than 10,000 miners worked the mine from 1928 to 1966.^[6]

The miners' greeting "Sretno" on a portico over the main road

Tourism

Decades after the mine's closure in 1966, Raša illustrates Italian rationalist industrial town planning from that period between the two world wars.

The municipality has invested €870,000 to refurbish the former coal mine as a tourist attraction. The new mining museum has opened in July 2023 after a year and a half of intensive renovation, with 1.5 kilometres of accessible tunnel.^[6]