By its very initial concept – meant to develop a central area of public institutions and services, along with an inhabiting area, the Piatra Alba Project was the main objective of the Company’s strategy to encourage the families from the project’s impact area to stay in Roşia Montană.

As the future civic centre of the Roşia Montană commune will  also be built in “Piatra Albă”, in addition to the residential area, a major criterion in choosing the location was that it is accessible from all the commune villages. Piatra Albă is right in the geographical centre of Rosia Montana, upstream from Gura Roşiei, on the hill between Rosia Valley and Vartop Valley, immediately to the north. The area is currently just a communal land, a mixture of pasture and forest, without any infrastructure available in the proximity. The location was chosen following consultations with the local authorities, the inhabitants and the experts.

The central area of the site will include public interest buildings, mayoralty, police station, post office, bank, church, school, multifunctional centre, museum, dispensary, pharmacy, commercial spaces, entertainment spaces or tourism facilities, inn, hotel, fair, sports ground, sports hall, ice-skating rink, football field, park and playgrounds.

In order to improve the community’s capacity to develop a non-mining economic sector in the future, Piatra Albă was designed as a future tourist village, the concept being proposed by specialists in the sustainable development of mountain areas. The project is trying to combine traditional architecture and community aspirations for access to modern public institutions, social and cultural services. The designers also tried to fully leverage the natural landscape where there will be future construction.

The future village of Piatra Albă will be developed on an area of 60 ha, and can accommodate up to 400 houses. So far, 24 families have opted for the Piatra Alba residential complex. Several house models were designed so that the people have more options (houses with several floors or one storey, with various land plot sizes).

In order to preserve the community and the social relations networks, the Company encourages the families from the project’s impact area to opt for resettlement, offering a series of benefits; thus, for those who choose a new construction in Piatra Albă, RMGC pays 25% of the total construction cost (house), and the owner will pay only 75% of the total value of the house.

-In the sale-purchase and exchange contracts, RMGC undertakes to provide a job for at least one member of the family in the mine construction phase.

RMGC maintains its interest to begin the construction of the new settlement as quickly as possible. In order to do so, it must go through several authorisation phases for the Piatra Albă complex.

By developing the new site at Piatra Albă, the Company aims at creating a model rural community in the area which will bring short, medium and long term benefits to the community, while increasing the area’s attractiveness and tourism potential, developing cultural tourism and industrial tourism, as well as offering other opportunities to sustainably capitalise on the area’s potential.

More details on Piatra Albă are available on www.piatraalba.eu