Historic

1840

Around 1840, Dr. Iosif Hanko, understanding the therapeutic role of salt baths and the possibilities of using lakes for this purpose, tried to make available to the local population, the rich natural therapeutic resources of the area.

Based on the data of qualitative chemical analyzes made on the water of Roman Lake, I. Hanko launches the idea of setting up a joint stock company to build and operate a series of spa facilities around Roman Lake, an idea shared between 1834-1837, by a part of the city’s inhabitants and supported by the then governor of Transylvania, Archduke Ferdinand Carol Iosif of Eastern Austria.

Around 1840, the new company built the first installations at the edge of Roman Lake, materialized by two bathrooms, to which, in 1842, six were added, and in 1843 another eight.

1848

Subsequently, due to the interest shown by the public in these bathrooms, the company, in full progress, increases the number of rooms to 25, distributed as follows: five cabins for men, six for women, three steam-heated valves, eight glass chambers heated naturally , three outdoor rooms and a swimming pool.

The activity of the baths continued, at a sustained pace, until 1848, when due to the social and political turmoil of that year, their development was slowed down, or even stopped, for a good period of time.

A new stage of development in the evolution of the resort – after in 1880, these baths became the property of the city – is related to the name of Edmond Velits, mayor of Turzii, at the initiative of which are planted slopes of the sinkhole, a hotel with 30 rooms is built , a restaurant, an entertainment pavilion and the capacity of receiving the hot baths is increased, which thus end up having 12 baths.

This stage of alterations and renewals lasts until the beginning of the twentieth century, after which the resort stagnates again and goes through a period of neglect that lasts almost 30 years.

1931

Starting with 1931, the city hall of Turda, resuming the thread of the past, shows again its interest for the development of the salt lakes.

Thus, the Roman lake was dredged, the shores were consolidated and the hot bath establishment was modernized. A square with over 200 cabins was built on the western shore of the lake, the surface between its sides being arranged as a beach.

The endowments of the resort were completed, in 1938, by the commissioning of a new hotel, with 30 rooms.

The period of the war and a good part of the years after it represented for the resort a new stage of stagnation.

In the following years, the landscaping works were aimed at consolidating, by concreting, the shores of Lake Roman, restoring the hot baths in the old hotel building and arranging accommodation, absolutely necessary, in the context in which the hotel built in 1938 it was destroyed.

1991

Due to the lack of interest shown by the authorities, the facilities of the bathrooms deteriorated more and more, ending up being closed at the end of the ’80s, which led to their complete destruction.

In 1991, the Hotel and the “Arieșul” Treatment Base was completed and put into use.

Initially, the natural healing factors used in the treatment base were chlorosodium salt water (source of the bottomless lake) and sapropelic mud.

After the opening of the treatment base in 1991, the problem of capitalization within the treatment base of another natural cure factor, the saline microclimate, was raised. The existence of the old salt mine in which the industrial activity of salt exploitation was stopped was a favorable premise for the achievement of this desideratum.