Urban growth of the city of Zacatecas and its human settlements on polymetallic mineralized zones

Abstract

The city of Zacatecas has grown rapidly in the last 15 years. Some irregular human settlements cover at present old-mined areas or not developed or even explored mining areas. The main areas considered in this paper are the loam of Las Bolsas, southeast of the city of Zacatecas, and the El Orito zone, in the southwest. The loam of Las Bolsas now is covered by irregular urban neighbourhoods, overlying the Tertiary polymictic red conglomerate of Zacatecas. Within this zone, there are at least five polymetallic veins with silver, lead, zinc, copper and gold mineralization. There also exist about ten shafts and some old mine workings as well as small adits and dumps. The old shafts of San Ignacio, El Gato and La Esperanza are now located within the city, as well as the old mines of Quebradilla, Buena Vista, El Piquete and El Edén. The El Orito zone covers over 3 km², and it is occupied by the suburbs known as La Pimienta, Lomas del Lago and Jesús González Ortega, among others. Outcropping in this zone, there was an important swarm of narrow siliceous veins, with a low-grade gold mineralization. This structural vein system runs almost north-south and was never economically evaluated... In order to continue, download full text in PDF.