The organisation of the fossil coal mining spaces in Asturias

Abstract

In a region of ancient industrial tradition as it is Asturias, coal mining, and even more fossil coal, has been the point of many essays done from different disciplines among which Geography stands out. However, this essay and doctoral thesis from which it starts, tries to discuss this subject, on the one hand, from a general approach proposing a range of categories of mining spaces which will contribute to a better knowledge of a basic activity of the industrialisation process, and on the other hand, from a wider perspective which allows the analysis of the regional industrial heritage to focus in a more properly context to take decisions. If we do not take into account this fact, the consequence, just from the simple definition of mining spaces, is that all of them are the same and therefore the discretion as regards its protection will continue being the only reality.