Learn Hardcore Croatian: Jučer je vozač autobusa rekao da u četvrtak neće biti gužve. - Yesterday the bus driver said that on Thursday there will not be a crowd.

In Croatian, short unstressed words like je, se, mi, ti, ga (called clitics) usually go in second position in the sentence, after the first stressed word or phrase.

Here, the first stressed word is Jučer (yesterday), so je has to come immediately after it:

Jučer je vozač autobusa rekao…

If you move jučer later, the clitic will still stay in second position:

Vozač autobusa je jučer rekao…
Vozač autobusa je rekao jučer…

The position of je is controlled by this “second position” rule, not by the subject vozač autobusa.

What exactly is the role of je with rekao? Could we leave it out?

Je is the auxiliary verb (3rd person singular present of biti – to be) used to form the past tense (perfekt).

Pattern for the past tense:

[auxiliary biti in present] + [past participle]

So:

on je rekao = he said / he has said

In your sentence:

Jučer je vozač autobusa rekao… = Yesterday the bus driver said…

If you remove je:

✗ Jučer vozač autobusa rekao…

this is ungrammatical in standard Croatian. You need the auxiliary for the normal past tense.

Why is it rekao and not some other form, and what would it look like if the speaker was a woman?

Rekao is the masculine singular past participle of reći (to say).

It agrees in gender and number with the subject:

on je rekao – he said (masc. sg.)
ona je rekla – she said (fem. sg.)
oni su rekli – they said (masc. pl. or mixed group)
one su rekle – they said (fem. pl.)

So if the bus driver was a woman, you’d say:

Jučer je vozačica autobusa rekla da u četvrtak neće biti gužve.
(vozačica = female driver)

Why is it vozač autobusa and not just vozač autobus?

In Croatian, when one noun specifies another (driver of the bus), the second noun is usually in the genitive case.

vozač autobusa = driver of the bus
- autobus (nominative) → autobusa (genitive singular)

Other examples:

vozač auta – driver of the car
učenik škole – pupil of the school
vrata kuće – door(s) of the house

So vozač autobus is wrong; you need the genitive autobusa to show that relation.

Could I also say autobusni vozač instead of vozač autobusa?

You can say autobusni vozač, and people will understand you, but:

vozač autobusa is the most natural, everyday way to say bus driver.
autobusni vozač sounds a bit more formal or technical, like a job title in a document.

So in normal conversation or narrative, vozač autobusa is preferred.

What does da do in this sentence? Is it the same as English that, and can I leave it out?

Here da introduces a subordinate clause that is the object of rekao:

rekao je (što?) da u četvrtak neće biti gužve
= he said (what?) that on Thursday there won’t be a crowd / traffic jam

It works much like English that in “He said that…”.

Important differences from English:

In Croatian, you cannot omit da here:
- ✗ Jučer je vozač autobusa rekao u četvrtak neće biti gužve. (incorrect)
- ✓ Jučer je vozač autobusa rekao da u četvrtak neće biti gužve.
You can sometimes use kako instead of da, with similar meaning:
- rekao je kako u četvrtak neće biti gužve.

So: da is obligatory in this kind of reported speech, unless you switch to direct speech with a colon and quotation marks.

Why is it neće biti and not something like ne bi bilo to match English “wouldn’t be”?

English often uses “would” in reported speech to show future from a past point:

Yesterday he said (that) there wouldn’t be traffic on Thursday.

Croatian usually does not shift the tense this way. It keeps the normal future:

Jučer je rekao da u četvrtak neće biti gužve.
= Literally: Yesterday he said that on Thursday there *will not be a crowd/traffic jam.*

So neće biti (future) is correct and natural here.

Ne bi bilo is the conditional:

ne bi bilo gužve (ako…) – there wouldn’t be a crowd (if…)

You would only use ne bi bilo if there is some condition (even if implied), not just simple future prediction.

Why is it gužve and not gužva at the end?

Gužve here is the genitive singular of gužva (crowd / jam).

There are two main reasons:

Negation + biti
With negated verbs, especially biti (to be), Croatian very often uses the genitive instead of the nominative to mean “any / some”:
- Bit će gužva. – There will be a crowd/jam. (nominative)
- Neće biti gužve. – There won’t be any crowd/jam. (genitive)
Partitive / “any” meaning
Gužve here basically means any (kind of) crowd/traffic. It’s like a partitive genitive: “there won’t be (any) gužva”.

Neće biti gužva is possible but would sound odd here; it would refer to some specific, expected gužva, not the general idea of rush/traffic.

What exactly does gužva mean here: crowd or traffic jam?

Gužva is a general word for crowding / being packed / congestion. The exact English word depends on the context.

Common uses:

gužva u autobusu – crowding in the bus, bus is packed
gužva u prometu / na cesti – a lot of traffic, traffic jam
gužva u gradu / u trgovini – crowd in the city/shop

In your sentence, with a bus driver talking and Thursday (often a work day context), it most naturally means:

“there won’t be rush / it won’t be crowded / there won’t be heavy traffic.”

Depending on what the learner has been told, you can translate it as crowd, rush, or traffic jam.

Why is it u četvrtak and not something like na četvrtak?

For days of the week, Croatian normally uses:

u + accusative
→ u četvrtak, u ponedjeljak, u petak, etc.
meaning “on Thursday / on Monday / on Friday”

So:

u četvrtak neće biti gužve – On Thursday there won’t be a crowd/jam.

Using na četvrtak would sound wrong here; na is used with other types of expressions (e.g. na stolu – on the table, na koncert – to the concert), but not for normal calendar days in this sense.

What case is četvrtak in, and why?

In u četvrtak, the noun četvrtak is in the accusative singular.

Pattern:

u + accusative = into, to, on (a specific day)
- u školu – to school
- u restoran – to the restaurant
- u četvrtak – on Thursday

So:

Nominative: četvrtak
Accusative: četvrtak (same form for many masculine nouns)

Even though the form looks the same as nominative, its role here is accusative governed by the preposition u.

Can I change the word order, for example say Vozač autobusa je jučer rekao da…? Does it change the meaning?

You can change the word order, and it stays grammatical:

Jučer je vozač autobusa rekao da u četvrtak neće biti gužve.
Vozač autobusa je jučer rekao da u četvrtak neće biti gužve.
Vozač autobusa je rekao jučer da u četvrtak neće biti gužve.

The basic meaning is the same in all of them.

Differences are mainly in focus and rhythm:

Starting with Jučer slightly emphasizes when it was said.
Starting with Vozač autobusa slightly emphasizes who said it.

The important thing is that je stays in that early clitic position, and the sentence remains clear.

Is jučer the same as juče that I sometimes hear?

Yes, they mean the same thing: “yesterday.”

jučer – standard Croatian
juče – common in some regional varieties and in Serbian/Bosnian

In standard Croatian, especially in writing and in Croatia-based materials, you should use jučer.