Esch-sur-Alzette

Esch-sur-Alzette is a city in southwestern Luxembourg in the valley of the Alzette River, bordering France about 15 kilometers southwest of Luxembourg City. First documented in 1128, it remained a modest farming village until the discovery of iron ore in the 1850s transformed it, with the steel company ARBED founded there in 1911 and the population rising from 810 in 1821 to 29,429 by 1930. The steel crisis of the 1970s brought mine and furnace closures, the last blast furnace shutting in 1997, and as of 2025 the city had 37,922 inhabitants, the country's second most populous commune. Industrial decline prompted urban renewal at the former Belval steelworks, now home to the Rockhal concert hall, a Kinepolis cinema and University of Luxembourg facilities, and the city was named a European Capital of Culture for 2022 alongside Kaunas and Novi Sad.