Cultural heritage tends to enhance development. Appropriate transformation of post-industrial objects can help discover the cultural landscape and add economic value. Research assumpts two goals. The first is to present the origins of the development of a new symbolic function, the effect by culture in a post-mining town in southern Poland. The second objective is to prove that culture is a new impetus for the city’s development, strengthening the processes of metropolization. The research area is Katowice, a city of 300 thousand of people in southern Poland._x000D_
On the one hand, it is the center of a tremendous functional region with a significant regional function; on the other hand, it is a small node in the network of global connections according to the classification of globalization and world cities. The research focuses on three issues. The first approximates the industrial origins of the city against the backdrop of a polycentric region of the conurbation type. The second approach is the problem of politics and management and the implementation of metropolitan projects with cultural functions. The third point describes business tourism and a new cultural product – the UNESCO Creative City of Music. It is concluded that Katowice has built a new symbolic function based on the culture. Heritage has become a carrier of development impulse for business tourism and events of international importance. Measurable metropolitan benefits are an essential multiplier element. The example of Katowice shows that the strategy and urban policy based on culture sets a new development trajectory._x000D_

Elżbieta Zuzańska-Żyśko
University of Silesia in Katowice Institute of Social and Economic Geography and Spatial Management Faculty of Natural Sciences
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