Bistrița-Năsăud County

Bistrița-Năsăud County

Județul Bistrița-Năsăud
Bistrița-Năsăud County Județul Bistrița-Năsăud
County
	Colibița Lake, Bistrița-Năsăud County
	Coat of arms
	Location of Bistrița-Năsăud County in Romania
Country	Romania
Development region1	Nord-Vest
Historic region	Transylvania
Capital city (Reședință de județ)	Bistrița
Government
• Type	County Council
• President of the County Council	Emil Radu Moldovan [ro] (PSD)
• Prefect2	Teofil-Iulian Cioarbă [ro]
Area
• Total	5,355 km2 (2,068 sq mi)
• Rank	26th in Romania
Population (1st of December 2021)
• Total	295,988
• Rank	32nd in Romania
• Density	55/km2 (140/sq mi)
Time zone	UTC+2 (EET)
• Summer (DST)	UTC+3 (EEST)
Postal Code	42wxyz3
Area code	+40 x634
Car Plates	BN5
GDP	US$3.730 billion (2024)
GDP per capita	US$12,601 (2024)
Website	County Council; County Prefecture
	1The developing regions of Romania have no administrative role, but were formed in order to manage funds from the European Union; 2 as of 2007, Romanian prefects are not politicians, but public functionaries. They are not allowed political party membership, and are banned from political activity for six months after resigning (or being excluded) from the public functionaries' corps.; 3w, x, y, and z are digits that indicate the city, the street, part of the street, or even the building of the address; 4x is a digit indicating the operator: 2 for the former national operator, Romtelecom, and 3 for the other ground telephone networks; 5used on both the plates of the vehicles that operate only in the county limits (like utility vehicles, ATVs, etc.), and the ones used outside the county

Bistrița-Năsăud (Romanian pronunciation: [ˈbistrit͡sa nəsəˈud] ^ⓘ) is a county (județ) of Romania, in Transylvania, with its capital city at Bistrița.

Name

In Hungarian, it is known as Beszterce-Naszód megye, and in German as Kreis Bistritz-Nassod. The name is identical with the county created in 1876, Beszterce-Naszód County (Romanian: Comitatul Bistrița-Năsăud) in the Kingdom of Hungary (the county was recreated in 1940 after the Second Vienna Award, as it became part of Hungary again until 1944). Except these, as part of Romania, until 1925 the former administrative organizations were kept when a new county system was introduced. Between 1925–1940 and 1945–1950, most of its territory belonged to the Năsăud County, with smaller parts belonging to the Mureș, Cluj, and Someș counties.

Geography

The county has a total area of 5,355 km² (2,068 sq mi). One third of this surface represents the mountains from the Eastern Carpathians group: the Țibleș, Rodna, Bârgău, and Călimani Mountains. The rest of the territory represents the North-East side of the Transylvanian Plateau.

The main river crossing the county is the Someșul Mare. On the Bistrița River there is a big dam and a lake.