1123 A key milestone in this evolution has been the action taken by the Spanish Cultural Heritage Institute (IPCE), which since the late 1990s has promoted comprehensive planning for industrial and mining heritage on a national scale. This approach took shape in the El Bierzo Charter on Industrial Mining Heritage, approved in 2008, which established minimum criteria for intervention in inactive mining complexes, including inventories, selection of relevant elements, legal protection, conservation, and dissemination (IPCE, 2009). This approach made it possible to consolidate a narrative of re-signification of the mining territory as a living cultural landscape, integrable into local development and sustainable tourism strategies. More recently, the Las Médulas Foundation has promoted the development of a Comprehensive Plan for the Management of Cultural and Natural Space, aimed at replacing and updating the previous 2013 Adaptation and Use Plan, in accordance with Law 7/2024 on Cultural Heritage in Castile and León. This new plan takes an explicitly integrated approach, combining heritage conservation, environmental management, mitigation of risks associated with climate change (such as forest fires and erosion), development of high-value tourism products, and local economic strengthening (Visit Las Médulas, 2025). Likewise, opening up spaces for dialogue with local communities, institutional actors, and experts seeks to reinforce the social legitimacy of territorial decisions and move toward co-responsible landscape management (CSIC, 2025). This feature connects directly with one of the empirical findings identified in this article: the need to move beyond purely consultative participation models and advance toward schemes of substantive involvement in defining the future of post-extractive territories. Las Médulas has been positioned as a “destination of excellence,” integrating heritage conservation with strategies for tourism promotion, environmental education, and cultural appreciation. This approach demonstrates how a postmining territory can generate new economic and symbolic functions, aligned with sustainability objectives (Visit Las Médulas, 2025). However, the case also reveals structural limitations. Dependence on heritage planning instruments, fragmentation of responsibilities, and vulnerability to extreme events—such as the forest fires that have occurred in recent years—have highlighted the need for more robust and up-to-date management frameworks capable of permanently coordinating environmental protection, public use, and risk management (CSIC, 2025). This confirms that post-mining territorial governance requires not only heritage recognition, but also enforceable and coordinated legal instruments. 4.3.2. Ruhr Area and Zollverein Coal Mine Industrial Complex (Germany) The German experience, and that of the Ruhr basin (North Rhine-Westphalia), is one of the most established examples of territorial governance of post-mining areas, demonstrating a planned transition from extractive economies to territorial models based on culture, environmental sustainability, and territorial regeneration. The process is supported by a decentralized federal framework and specific legal instruments, such as the North Rhine-Westphalia Monument Protection and Maintenance Act (Denkmalschutzgesetz – DSchG, 1980), which establishes a comprehensive regime for the protection, conservation, promotion, and financing of industrial heritage, requiring conservation plans integrated with the heritage objectives of urban land-use planning, enabling effective coordination between mining heritage and land-use planning. On this basis, the conversion of the Zollverein Coal Mine Industrial Complex, located in the city of Essen in the Ruhr basin, was developed. Likewise, the creation of the Zollverein Foundation (Stiftung Zollverein) in 1998 consolidated a multi-stakeholder governance model aimed at preserving heritage and transforming the site into an international cultural, economic, and tourist center. In 2001, the complex was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, reinforcing its legal protection and global visibility (Gallego, 2011; Romero, 2019). North Rhine-Westphalia promoted a model based on the welfare economy, through the cultural enhancement of heritage, and on the ecological economy, through the environmental, economic, and social recovery of the territory (Alquézar, 2013; Romero, 2019). The impacts of this post-mining territorial governance are reflected in subsequent recognitions, such
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTM0Mzk2