About us
In each of the municipalities, there are one or more “Porte del Parco” (Gateways to the Park), which are Reception Centres, Information Points, Documentation Centres and Museums and organise itineraries and guided visits, didactic workshops, seminars, vocational training courses, School-Work experiences and activities for undergraduates and doctoral students or post-graduate university courses.
Established in 2002 by Decree of the Ministry of the Environment now covers an area of 1187 sq. km and includes the territories of seven municipalities of the Colline Metallifere in the province of
Grosseto: Follonica, Scarlino, Gavorrano, Massa Marittima, Montieri, Monterotondo Marittimo, Roccastrada to which the geothermal areas of the municipalities of Castelnuovo in Val di Cecina and Pomarance in the province of Pisa and Radicondoli in the province of Siena were added as part of the Geopark in 2022.
The Colline Metallifere National Park is managed by a consortium of which the Ministry of the Environment (MASE), the Ministry of Culture (MiC) (former
Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities (Mibact), the Region of Tuscany,Province of Grosseto, Unione dei Comuni Montana Colline Metallifere and the seven municipal administrations.
The institutional aims of the Park regard the recovery, conservation and valorisation of the environmental, historical-cultural and technical-scientific heritage of the Metalliferous Hills, particularly marked by the mining experience, promoting a tourist circuit mining experience, promoting a tourist-cultural circuit, implementing projects linked to sustainability and the green economy.
The preservation of the geological, mining and archaeo-industrial heritage, the quality of the natural, environmental and landscape resources combined with the value of the archaeological evidence and the important examples of architecture and art, make it a varied protected area characterised by a unique and richly complex landscape. An ideal place to experience slow and unique tourism that follows the theme of rediscovering mining and underground work, and that narrates almost 300 million years of the Earth’s geological history. For all these reasons, the Park is also a Geopark part of the UNESCO World Network of Geoparks.