2018Europa - Bridges - First Day Cover

At the beginning of the 18th century, after the end of the War of the Spanish Succession and the war against the Ottoman Empire, the conditions to revive the economy and trading on the area of Croatia were met creating a need to connect Pannonia with the coastal area by a road through the mountainous area of Gorski kotar. In 1718, the Croatian Parliament approved the proposal to build a road from Karlovac through Novigrad na Dobri, Delnice and Javornik to the port in Kraljevica. However, the construction started a while later, in 1725, and was fully completed in 1738. The designer and builder of the road named Via Carolina Augusta, today known as Karolinska cesta, was Matija Antun Weiss (1661 – 1738). The road was named after the ruling emperor, Charles IV, who personally travelled the passable section of the route in 1728. The road is around 60 miles or roughly 106 km long and the planned costs were 70,000 forints. In order to cross over certain streams and rivers, several bridges had to be built on the road, typically wooden constructions on stone columns and abutments.