Reclamation in the 1990s is contingent upon whatever we, as professionals, learn from our reclamation experience in the 1970s and 1980s and our abilities to improve on future reclamation efforts. We have progressed from a mining free-for-all, 25 years ago, with no reclamation strategies, to a post-mine "fix-up" attitude, to the pre-mine progressive reclamation planning approach that now exists.
We have already learned from our mi stakes over the past two decades and are now in the process of cleaning up some of the damage incurred as a result of those errors. This paper focusses on two of the many reclamation efforts directed at cleaning up the landscape scars left from our development free-for-all days of the 1950 to 1960s and even into the 1970s. The two reclamation examples that will be discussed relate to gravel pit reclamation in an urban context.