Nord-Pas de Calais Mining Basin
The site is a striking landscape, the product of three centuries of coal mining from the 18th to the 20th century, and consists of 109 separate parts covering 120,000 hectares. The site features mining pits (the oldest of which date back to 1850) and lift infrastructure, slag heaps (some covering 90 hectares and reaching heights of over 140 metres), coal transport infrastructure, railway stations, workers’ estates and mining villages, including social settlements, schools, religious buildings, health and community facilities, company premises, houses for owners and managers, a town hall, etc. The site bears witness to the quest to create a model workers’ city from the mid-19th century to the 1960s, and further illustrates an important period in the history of European industrialisation. It documents the living conditions of workers and the worker solidarity it aroused.