Prioritisation strategies for regional brownfield redevelopment: Perspectives & Feedback on existing tools and approaches

Brownfield reuse is increasingly advocated as an alternative to sealing so far undeveloped land. Several European companies, communities and regions have built brownfield registers to steer brownfield investments. Having different brownfield redevelopment options, a proper selection of most promising sites is a pre-requisite to efficiently allocate the limited financial resources. Authorities are in need of strategies and tools to screen wide areas with a large number of brownfields to identify locations with best potentials for redevelopment. The French Alsace regional authorities and the Auvergne Rhone Alpes Regional Council are strongly supporting prioritisation approaches by being involved in brownfield redevelopment initiatives. Only a few tools supporting “regional brownfield prioritisation” strategies already exist or are in the process of being developed for administrations and brownfield portfolio managers. These are mainly spatial decision support tools based on multi-criteria analysis (MCA). Noteworthy is the Timbre Brownfield Prioritization Tool (TBPT), a freely available web-based tool assisting stakeholders in brownfield reuse. It was developed under the TIMBRE FP7 R&I project. A similar prioritisation tool relying on a MCA is being developed and tested for the French Alsace Regional authority. This tool is required as part of a regional strategy to encourage transparent decision-making process in sites prioritisation and selection, especially for those where groundwater is potentially contaminated and would benefit from state funding for remediation. The Auvergne-Rhone Alpes region, through its regional brownfield initiative called “ID Friche”, is developing an approach to provide tools to inform decision makers in how to improve efficiency of brownfields redevelopment. The aims of the session are to share knowledge and experience on prioritisation approaches and to discuss best ways to develop prioritisation tools being sensitive for different spatial dimensions, e.g. the national and regional context. Part 1 Presentations on existing prioritisation approaches state-of-art: -Development of a brownfield prioritisation tools for the French Alsacian local authority based on available data (E. Limasset, BRGM, FR) -Feedbacks from the application of the TIMBRE prioritisation tool in 5 case studies at European level (L. Pizzol, University Ca’Foscari Venice, IT) -Co-Design of a brownfield prioritisation approach for the French Auvergne Rhone Alpes Regional Council from a stakeholders’ needs perspective (C. Merly & B. Clozel, BRGM, FR) -Challenges and obstacles in transdisciplinary research: The case of a web-based brownfield prioritisation tool development (P. Klusacek, Institute of Geonics, CZ). Part 2 Discussions on expectations, perceptions, experiences and concerns related to effective brownfield prioritisation. Debate on ways to proceed to develop suitable and effective prioritisation tools (available data or stakeholders’ needs, or both) in order to draw recommendations and incentives for improved prioritisation tool development and use according to different scenarios.