|
With a little over
35,000 residents, Lens resembles the Tom
Thumb of the host cities for RWC 2007.
And it still is the smallest town to have
staged a major sporting event with matches
in the 1998 World Cup soccer finals. The
Pas-de-Calais regional authority might
these days be active in sport but its history
is inextricably linked to coal mining.
In 1720, the first
coal seams were discovered nearby at Anzin.
More and more pits opened from 1840 to
exploit the black gold of this 120km-long
bowl. The inter-war years marked the height
of mining in the area with production reaching
35 million tonnes in 1930 to power the
steel and chemical industries. Forty years
later coal mining went into rapid decline
and pits closed one after the other until
the last mine stopped working in 1990.
The black mugs, as
the miners were called, may have disappeared
but they left behind an unchanging tradition:
the Ch’ti, the local dialect now
used to describe anyone from the Nord-Pas-de-Calais,
the beer festivals, or ducasses (foires)
... Yet the city has not stood still. It
has launched itself into a makeover which
has seen seven business parks set up to
diversify the local economy (textiles,
automobile manufacturing, food processing).
A scientific hub, engineering school and
several technical colleges help dynamise
a youthful area where 41 per cent of Lens
residents are under 25.
Stade Félix
Bollaert is a football stadium in Lens,
France, that was built in 1932. It is the
home of RC Lens. The stadium's capacity
is 41,233 (larger than Lens' current population
of roughly 37,000). It takes its name from
a commercial director of a local mining
company who died shortly before the inauguration
of the stadium. The stadium will also be
hosting matches during the 2007 Rugby World
Cup.
|
