The Industrial Cultural Landscape of the Ruhr: Its Structures and Perspectives

Abstract

In several phases from the 1840s to the 1960s, the Ruhr developed into Europe’s largest industrial conurbation, whereby the intensity of the industrial impact varied from phase to phase, resulting in different socio-economic and spatial structures. Since the 1960s, as a reaction to the deindustrialization of the coal mining and the iron and steel industries, new industrial allocations and comprehensive forms of regional and urban planning created new economic foundations, eliminated urban deficits and caused an overall structural change. Nevertheless, the basic spatial structures of the Ruhr still prove that this cultural landscape has in large parts been developed exclusively to the locational requirements of the coal and steel industries. Due to its global uniqueness, however, “industrial cultural landscape Ruhrgebiet” has also became an identity-forming term with a positive external impact, especially on tourism.