ABSTRACT
Mining cities, also known as mining towns or mining communities, are vulnerable urban settlements that have developed from extracting and processing natural resources. In China, almost a quarter of cities were built on mining; in total there are 178 mining cities. The growth, shrinkage, and transformation of mining cities are nothing new for advanced industrialized countries, due to the combined effects of de-industrialization, suburbanization, and globalization. The transformation process of the mining cities alongside China's recent regional revitalization strategies, such as the development of the west, northeast revitalization, and the rise of central China, has been overlooked by studies specializing in the urban transformation of China, partly because of their remote location and their peripheral role in Chinas industrialization and urbanization. The key issue for the urban transformation of mining cities is determining what will replace the mining activities once the resource is exhausted or is no longer considered economical to extract.
