Timisoara

The Hungarian name of the city, Temesvár, was first recorded as Temeswar in 1315. It refers to a castle (vár) on the Timiș River (Temes). Timiș belongs to the family of hydronyms derived from the Indo-European radical thib 'swamp'. The Romanian and German oikonyms (Timișoara and Temeschburg, respectively) derived from the Hungarian form. The Ottoman administration used Temeşvar which was derived from Temesvár. The Habsburg/Austrian authorities also used Temeschwar, Temeswar or Temeschburg, names that have become commonplace in current usage. The name of the city comes from the river which passes the city, Timișul Mic (German: Kleine Temesch; Hungarian: Kistemes), hydronym which was in use until the 18th century when it was changed to Bega or Beghei.

The southeastern part of the Pannonian Basin is bounded by the Mureș, the Tisza and the Danube; the region was very fertile and already offered favorable conditions for food and human livelihood in 4000 BC. Archeological remains attested the presence of a population of farmers, hunters and artisans, whose existence was favored by mild climate, fertile soil and abundant water and forests. The first identifiable civilization in Banat were the Dacians who left traces of their past. Several Romanian historians have advanced the idea that the current location of Timișoara corresponds to the Dacian settlement of Zurobara. Although its location is unknown, the coordinates given by geographer Ptolemy in Geographike Hyphegesis place it in the northwest of Banat. …

Timișoara is located at the intersection of the 45th parallel north with the 21st meridian east. As a mathematical position, it is in the Northern Hemisphere, almost equally distant from the North Pole and the equator, and in the Eastern Hemisphere, using Central European Time. The local time of the city (considered after the meridian) is 1 h 25' 8" ahead of the Greenwich Mean Time, but it is 34' 52" behind the official time of Romania (Eastern European Time). Timișoara lies at an altitude of 90 meters on the southeast edge of the Banat Plain, part of the Pannonian Plain, near the divergence of the Timiș and Bega rivers. The waters of the two rivers form a swampy and frequently flooded land. Timișoara developed on one of few places where the swamps could be crossed. …

Timișoara has the largest architectural ensemble of historic buildings in Romania (around 14,500), consisting of the urban patrimony of the neighborhoods of Cetate, Fabric, Iosefin and Elisabetin. Most of these buildings are part of the imperial heritage, a period of economic prosperity that left its mark on the city. The architectural diversity, represented by baroque, historicism, neoclassicism, Art Nouveau and Wiener Secession, earned Timișoara the nickname "Little Vienna". The oldest building in Timișoara is Huniade Castle, which today houses the Museum of Banat. Destroyed during the siege of 1849, the castle was later rebuilt, but still retains elements of the former castle built by John Hunyadi between 1443 and 1447, but also elements from the period of Charles I of Hungary. Timișoara is a city with a polynuclear urban structure. …

Timișoara is one of the most dynamic economic centers in Romania. Based on its proximity to the western border, Timișoara has managed to attract many foreign investments in recent years, forming, together with Arad, the second largest area in Romania in terms of economic mass. By the mid-2000s, the foreign investments in Timișoara amounted to €753 per capita, compared to €450 per capita at county level. Most of these investments come from the EU countries, especially from Italy, Germany and France. Similar to other growth poles in Romania, the services sector has developed significantly in recent years, accounting for half of the revenues. After the fall of communism and the transition to a market economy, the private sector grew steadily. …

Timișoara is an important regional road and railway hub, connecting the city to Bucharest and other major cities, as well as Romania to Hungary and Serbia, and further to Western Europe. It is located along the Pan-European Corridor IV linking Germany to Turkey and has access, thanks to the Bega Canal, to the Pan-European Corridor VII. Furthermore, Timișoara is crossed by two TEN-T core network corridors: Orient/East–Med and Rhine–Danube (waterway focus). The street plot of Timișoara is composed of 1,278 streets totaling almost 750 km (470 mi). The street network is based on a radial model, consolidated by a series of five concentric rings, none of them completely built. Unlike other cities of similar size, there is no predominant corridor in terms of loading, with traffic volumes distributed fairly evenly across a series of radial and circular arteries. …