{"title":"Revitalizing post-communist urban industrial areas: Divergent narratives in the imagining of copper mine reopening and tourism in a Romanian town","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.cities.2024.105379","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>The post-communist period has strongly impacted the former communist Romania's urban industrial areas. Recent debates regarding urban industrial towns in Central and Eastern Europe reveal that their governance has been prone to neglect and that a lack of jobs has led to depopulation, seasonal migration, and a change in local labour skills. Drawing on 20 in-depth interviews with community leaders in Moldova Nouă, Romania, this study presents divergent narratives on the development of the local economy around the reopening of a copper mine and tourism. The findings suggest that, given the town's excellent position on the River Danube and its proximity to the Danube Gorges, tourism is perceived as a long-term solution. However, to date, tourism has not proved to be a major economic engine for the local population but could be of great interest for further local development. On the other hand, although copper mining proved polluting in communist times, some respondents prefer reopening the mines to have better paid jobs.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":48405,"journal":{"name":"Cities","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":6.0000,"publicationDate":"2024-08-12","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264275124005936/pdfft?md5=a19a84de7dade7f960dc5b222dd1cdf0&pid=1-s2.0-S0264275124005936-main.pdf","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Cities","FirstCategoryId":"96","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264275124005936","RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"URBAN STUDIES","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
The post-communist period has strongly impacted the former communist Romania's urban industrial areas. Recent debates regarding urban industrial towns in Central and Eastern Europe reveal that their governance has been prone to neglect and that a lack of jobs has led to depopulation, seasonal migration, and a change in local labour skills. Drawing on 20 in-depth interviews with community leaders in Moldova Nouă, Romania, this study presents divergent narratives on the development of the local economy around the reopening of a copper mine and tourism. The findings suggest that, given the town's excellent position on the River Danube and its proximity to the Danube Gorges, tourism is perceived as a long-term solution. However, to date, tourism has not proved to be a major economic engine for the local population but could be of great interest for further local development. On the other hand, although copper mining proved polluting in communist times, some respondents prefer reopening the mines to have better paid jobs.
后共产主义时期对前共产主义国家罗马尼亚的城市工业区产生了强烈影响。最近有关中欧和东欧城市工业城镇的讨论表明,这些城镇的管理容易被忽视,就业机会的缺乏导致人口减少、季节性移民和当地劳动力技能的变化。本研究通过对罗马尼亚 Moldova Nouă 的社区领袖进行 20 次深入访谈,介绍了围绕铜矿重开和旅游业发展当地经济的不同说法。研究结果表明,由于该镇位于多瑙河畔,毗邻多瑙河峡谷,因此旅游业被视为一个长期解决方案。然而,迄今为止,旅游业尚未成为当地居民的主要经济引擎,但却对当地的进一步发展具有重大意义。另一方面,虽然铜矿开采在共产主义时期造成了污染,但一些受访者更倾向于重开铜矿,以获得收入更高的工作。
期刊介绍:
Cities offers a comprehensive range of articles on all aspects of urban policy. It provides an international and interdisciplinary platform for the exchange of ideas and information between urban planners and policy makers from national and local government, non-government organizations, academia and consultancy. The primary aims of the journal are to analyse and assess past and present urban development and management as a reflection of effective, ineffective and non-existent planning policies; and the promotion of the implementation of appropriate urban policies in both the developed and the developing world.