see page 5 of the AQA revision guide

The Alps

• Location: Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Liechtenstein, Slovenia, Switzerland {Central Europe}
• Formation: Around 30million years ago by the collision between African and European plates
• Tallest peak: Mont Blanc {4810m, Italian-French border}
• Population: 12million people

Uses

• Farming
  • Goats {milk, cheese, meat} farmed on steep upland areas
  • Sunnier slopes terraced to plant vineyards {Lavaux, Switzerland}
• Tourism
  • 100million tourists a year
  • 70% of tourists visit the snow covered mountains for skiing, snowboarding, ice climbing
  • Summer tourism includes mountain biking, walking, climbing, paragliding
  • New villages built to cater for the quantity of tourists {Tignes, France}
• HEP
  • Narrow valleys dammed to generate HEP {Berne, Switzerland}
    • Switzerland gets 60% of its electricity from HEP stations
  • Electricity produced is used locally and exported to towns and cities further away
• Mining
  • Salt, iron ore, gold, silver, copper are were mined
  • Declined dramatically due to foreign sources being cheaper
• Forestry
  • Scots Pine planted all over Alps as it is more resilient to goats, which kill native tree saplings
  • Trees logged and sold to make things like furniture

Adaptations

• Steep relief
  • Goats are farmed because they have adapted to live on steep mountains
  • Trees and man-made defences protect against avalanches/rock slides
• Poor soils
  • Animals are grazed in higher areas, where soil isn't good enough to grow crops
• Limited communications
  • Roads built over passes {Brenner Pass, Austria-Italy}, but often blocked by snow
  • Tunnels cut through mountains to provide faster transport links