Environmental Sciences June 2006; 3(2): 135 151

RESEARCH ARTICLE

Sustainable development and browneld regeneration. What denes the quality of derelict land recycling?

MARTIN FRANZ1, GERNOT PAHLEN2, PAUL NATHANAIL3, NICOLE OKUNIEK1, & ALEKSANDRA KOJ4
1 2

Zentrum fur interdisziplinare Ruhrgebietsforschung der Ruhr-Universitat Bochum, Germany, Montan-Grundstucksgesellschaft mbH, Essen, Germany, 3University of Nottingham, Land Quality Management Group, School of Geography, University Park, Nottingham, and 4Geoenvironmental Research Centre, Cardiff School Of Engineering, Cardiff University

Abstract Browneld regeneration, involving the reintegration of derelict and abandoned sites into their economic environments, is a key element of sustainable urban development. To realize the full potential browneld regeneration offers to sustainable urban development, the parameters that inuence the degree of sustainability within browneld regeneration itself have to be understood. An analysis of eight sites in four European countries identied strengths and weaknesses in current browneld regeneration practice. Among other outcomes, criteria for sustainable browneld projects and the Sustainability Assessment Tool for browneld regeneration projects (SAT) were developed. The tool is based on a framework of objectives, indicators and best practices that reect the multidimensional and multi-stakeholder complexity that characterizes browneld regeneration. The SAT would be one option to implement sustainability criteria without waiving the local and regional context. The SAT offers one way for browneld projects being put forward for public and specically European Union, funding to be evaluated. This would be a remarkable innovation, leading to not only more efcient use of public money but also an increase in quality of browneld regeneration.

Keywords: Browneld regeneration, sustainability, indicators, objectives, Sustainability Assessment Tool (SAT), citizen participation

1. Introduction Deindustrialization has resulted in the creation of browneld sites throughout all the traditional industrial regions of Europe. The EC funded expert network on browneld regeneration, Concerted Action on Browneld and Economic Regeneration Network (CABERNET), dened browneld sites (modifying the work of the Contaminated Land

Correspondence: Nicole Okuniek, Zentrum fur interdisziplinare Ruhrgebietsforschung der Ruhr-Universitat Bochum, 44780 Bochum, Germany. Tel: 49 234 322 3381. Fax: 49 234 322 14484. E-mail: nicole.okuniek@rub.de ISSN 1569-3430 print/ISSN 1744-4225 online 2006 Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/15693430600800873

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Rehabilitation Network for Environmental Technologies (CLARINET) slightly but signicantly) as: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. sites that have been affected by the former uses of the site and surrounding land; are derelict and underused; may have real or perceived contamination problems; are mainly in developed urban areas; and require intervention to bring them back to benecial use (Oliver et al. 2005).

Former industrial regions are often characterized by large extents of brownelds, a shrinking but ageing population and a weakening economy. For example in the Ruhr in Germany a loss of 270 000 inhabitants according to a loss of purchasing power is forecasted between the years 2003 and 2020 (Projekt Ruhr 2005). Leaving the elderly people behind, this process is fostering the social segregation. Given the additional fact that within industrial regions an ongoing relocation towards sub- or exurban areas is experienced as a mainstream trend, the overall locational dynamic apparently does not operate in favour of old industrial regions. Though it is just here, where the supply of space and locations is given or can be generated: industrial brownelds and nowadays even residential areas offer abundant resources to scarce demand (Butzin 2005). Ferber and Grimski (2002), for CLARINET reported some 14 500 ha of browneld sites for Belgium, 20 000 ha for France, 128 000 ha for Germany, 9 000 to 11 000 ha for the Netherlands and 39 600 ha for the UK. The 2004 expansion of the EU from 15 to 25 member states, added signicant tracts of former mining, heavy industrial, railway and military sites to the European browneld stock. The signicance of the browneld issue is well understood at the European level. Their adverse socioeconomic impacts, has brought brownelds high on the radar of European Union regional development, environmental protection and urban initiatives. While many European directives come from a technical environmental protection and control background, addressing relevant browneld aspects separately (e.g. Waste Framework Directive, Landll Directive, Communication Towards a specic soil protection strategy which is envisaged to lead to a Soil Directive, EU Environmental Impact Assessment Directive etc.), a shift can be observed in European browneld policies to simultaneously address environmental protection and spatial planning issues. Browneld sites are not solely discussed in technical terms anymore (e.g. contamination), but as an opportunity for saving resources and delivering sustainable urban development. Such integrated thinking reects the complexity of browneld regeneration, and its social, environmental, economic and institutional implications. National priorities are also changing. The UK government published a revised version of its sustainable development strategy in March 2005. The Governments new planning policy statement Delivering Sustainable Development is aiming at planning with sustainable development at its heart: The planning system is key to achieving sustainable development (Defra 2005). To realize the full potential browneld regeneration offers to sustainable urban development, the parameters that inuence the degree of sustainability within browneld regeneration itself have to be understood: Which requirements should browneld projects have to meet to be regarded as sustainable? Which parameters characterize sustainable browneld regeneration processes? How can the compliance of browneld regeneration projects with these requirements be assessed to generate support for future funding and permitting decisions? Answers to these questions are required by decision makers and other

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stakeholders striving for sustainable browneld regeneration, be they private or public sector developers, regulators or funders (Glockner et al. 2004). The Regeneration of European Sites in Cities and Urban Environments (RESCUE) project (2002 2005) has developed a method that is meant to answer the above questions: The Sustainability Assessment Tool (SAT). RESCUE was a research project funded under key action IV Cities of tomorrow and cultural heritage of Energy, environment and sustainable development within the 5th Framework Programme of the European Community. RESCUE comprised 14 partner institutions from France, Germany, Poland and the UK, representing a wide range of different stakeholder interests and competences in browneld regeneration. RESCUE analysed the current practice in browneld regeneration against the background of sustainability and tried to derive improvements for the applied procedures. The analysis was based on eight case studies in industrial core regions in France (Nord-Pas de Calais), Germany (Ruhr Area; South of Leipzig Region), Poland (Silesia) and the UK (East Midlands; Tyne and Wear). The results and ndings of RESCUE are included in an integrated approach, which is presented in the manual Best practice guidance for sustainable browneld regeneration (Edwards et al. 2005). Thus, the Sustainability Assessment Tool does not stand alone. It is based on an elaborate framework of objectives, indicators, best practices and tools that reects the multidimensional and multi-stakeholder complexity that characterizes sustainable browneld regeneration. This paper presents the RESCUE approach to sustainable browneld regeneration and, as one of the main outputs of the project, the Sustainability Assessment Tool and its analytical background. The SAT is offered as one way of ensuring the publicly funded regeneration projects are likely to constitute sustainable development. 2. Browneld regeneration and the need for public funding The regeneration of browneld sites is often not competitive with greeneld sites without public intervention. Some common reasons for brownelds high rehabilitation costs and reduced real estate value are: wrong location, legacy infrastructure or contamination (Doetsch et al. 1999). Browneld redevelopment therefore often requires publicnancial, scal, legal, regulatory and policyincentives. Three basic groups of brownelds sites can be identied (Millar et al. 2005; Ferber 1997; Dennison 1998): a. Viable sites: economically viable sites where the private market is already working toward regeneration without public-sector assistance. The regeneration of this kind of brownelds has from investment perspective greater advantages than risks. Sites like this can be found in economically dynamic locations. b. Marginally non-viable sites: brownelds that cannot be redeveloped without public-sector funding. Reasons can be signicant contamination leading to high remediation costs or inadequate infrastructure or access coupled with low real estate prices. With the help of public funding it is possible to nd private investors who bring new hard uses on these sites. Examples for this are a lot of regeneration projects in the Ruhr where with the help of public subsidies new leisure or retail related uses were built on sites of former heavy industry. c. Non-viable sites: sites with either overwhelming contamination or extremely limited economic possibilities due to an adverse location. Substantial public funding is required to bring these sites into new uses. These sites often end up with green usesparks in urban areas or reforestation in rural areas (see Figure 1).

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Figure 1. CABERNET ABC ModelEnabling or impeding effect of currently available incentives for the implementation of an appropriate sustainable land use on particular browneld sites.

Old industrial regions are characterized by b and c sitesa consequence of the depressed economic conditions in such areas. Browneld regeneration relies on public funding to proceed let alone become economically viable (Thornton et al. 2005). Against the background of the structural crisis of public households, those browneld sites with high remediation or rehabilitation costs but a limited possible revenuethe B and C sites (Figure 1)often will not be redeveloped due to a lack of public (co-) funding. Thornton et al. (2005), report an analysis of the benets and deciencies of current nancial, scal, legal, regulatory and policy incentives relevant to sustainable browneld development. The decision to publicly fund browneld regeneration projects is often based on the assumption that browneld regeneration is generally sustainable merely by dint of the fact that browneld redevelopment reduces development on greenelds. However, the need for quality in a regeneration project to be considered as sustainable is taken into account only insufciently. Often successful regeneration proposals involve unsustainable methods: obviously untenable in an era when supposedly all policy is being driven by sustainable development principles. It should be the aim that only the most sustainable browneld regeneration projects are eligible for European funding thereby raising the quality of the results and making better use of the nite and time limited availability of regeneration budgets. This begs the questions: What makes browneld regeneration sustainable? Can this be predicted? 3. What is sustainable browneld regeneration? Sustainability is subject to a wide range of interpretations (Arts 1994). In isolation, it conveys an impression of longevity and endurance. The Brundtland report provided the most widely cited and though less and less widely accepted denition of sustainable development (World Commission on Environment and Development 1987): Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.

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A particular frame of reference is needed if the concept of sustainability is to have any meaning at the level of practical problem solving. The more specic this frame of reference, the easier it will be to dene what is meant by sustainabilityor, less clumsily, at least its unwanted opposite. Thus, RESCUE developed an approach that makes the concept of sustainability operable for the context of browneld regeneration. This approach is based on the recognition of four dimensions to sustainability: environmental, economic, social and institutional (UN Commission on Sustainable Development 2001). Sustainability is neither static in time nor does it imply a xed spatial perspective. It cannot be seen as a destination but rather as a never ending journeyat least on the timescale at which human society operates. Thus, besides the above mentioned dimensions of sustainability there are also different scopes of sustainability: . Time scale: the concept of sustainability requires a balance between short term effects versus long term effects in each of the four dimensions. This includes the consideration of future needs, therefore, the concept has an inter-generational aspect. A project that may have very positive impacts in the short term may have very negative impacts in the long termor vice versa. Spatial perspective: the spatial extent and scale of a projects impact need to be dened in all three spatial dimensions, as well as political, administrative or functional spatial units. Different levels of action are addressed, i.e. the local, communal, regional, national, transnational and global level. The regional perspective allows for balancing out site specic problems and potentials within a wider spatial context. This context is very important: a project that possibly appears to be sustainable at a local level can be detrimental on a regional level. Given globalization and inter region/inter city competition, the boundary within which sustainability is to be assessed is also relevant. Dynamic situation: the process of moving towards sustainability will always be subject to change, i.e. a nal state with an equal degree of sustainability in the four dimensions will never be reached. Continual change is part of humanitys history and, therefore, it must be embraced by the concept of sustainability.

On the basis of these dimensions and scopes a denition of sustainable browneld regeneration has been developed: Sustainable Browneld Regeneration is the management, rehabilitation and return to benecial use of brownelds in such a manner as to ensure the attainment and continued satisfaction of human needs for present and future generations in environmentally sensitive, economically viable, institutionally robust and socially acceptable ways within the particular regional context (RESCUE 2003). This still very broad and general denition was further rened into major elds of work within browneld regeneration, and led to the denition of sustainability objectives and indicators for the . . . . . planning processes and methods for citizen participation; sustainable land use and urban design on browneld sites; management and reuse of existing buildings and infrastructures; the reuse of soil and debris and management of risk from contamination; and the management of browneld regeneration projects.

Sustainable is not synonymous with green. The regeneration of a browneld site can cause negative environmental impacts and yield a sustainable outcome, e.g. positive effects in the

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other dimensions of sustainability may outweigh the negative ecological ones and the negative impacts on the site are balanced on the urban/regional scale. If this was not so, all browneld sites would have to be left untouched! A needed industrial development on a browneld site (despite its unavoidable negative environmental impacts) can be more sustainable than a public park on the same site, as it helps preserve alternative greeneld sites. In addition, the proposed development could generate jobs resulting in positive effects in the social and economic dimensions. Increases in local municipality income could be allocated to environmental improvements in the surrounding area. This means a browneld project that does not cause any negative environmental impacts overall does not necessarily need to be more sustainable than a dirty industrial development where potential wealth generating activities and development in the broader regional context are more sustainable. The denition of sustainable regeneration is not meant to imply that sustainable development should be regarded as a situation that can be achieved or a destination that can be reached at some time in the future. Rather it is a journey through the ever-competing interests of the four dimensions that seeks to optimize the impacts and benets while preserving the freedom of action and range of options of future generations. The focus should not be on situations regarded as optimal from todays perspective, but on the potential exibility of the instruments used to approach sustainable development. Regarding experiments at sustainable browneld regeneration as learning opportunities also means that the understanding and characterizationthe avour or very essenceof sustainability (which is always a normative concept), the instruments for its implementation and the indicators for its quantication or observation can (and will) change over time (BBR 2000). We can of course dene sustainability only from todays perspective and our evaluation of previous practices. The process of sustainable development requires a continuous re-evaluation in order to adapt to changing boundary conditions, priorities and evolving knowledge and technology. This requires much exibility in the steering of the process. These principles have to be taken into account when the denition of sustainable browneld regeneration is operationalized into objectives and indicators. 4. Sustainability objectives and indicators Objectives and indicators should support decision makers and other stakeholders in browneld regeneration projects such as regulators, policy makers, public administration and government authorities, investors, land owners and developers, consultants, academics, community groups, technology providers and the nancial sector. The following objectives represent criteria that are met by sustainable browneld regeneration projects: the management and reuse of existing buildings is in compliance with sustainability objectives while retaining or reusing buildings and infrastructures on browneld sites. The management of risk from contamination and the reuse of soil and debris include e.g. the reduction of negative environmental impacts on the site and in the neighbourhood including human health risks. The improvement of societal acceptance through identication and engagement of all stakeholders and to ensure cost effectiveness and technical feasibility are criteria as well. A minimized energy and water demand and the production of renewable energy on the site contribute to sustainability. Land use and urban design on browneld sites are regarded as sustainable when land use functions match regional socio-economic demands and needs. The integration of the reuse of browneld sites into a regional land management and into the urban development are seen as sustainability objectives as well. Besides saving resources the achievement of benets and the prevention of adverse impacts on the local

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neighbourhood are in line with sustainability. Another criterion for sustainability objective is to generate and safeguard employment and economic development. The sustainability objectives for planning processes and methods for citizen participation are besides others to obtain better quality information, the improvement of information ow and to deliver a fair discussion process and conict resolution. The empowerment of citizens, especially those representing non-organized interests and the delegation of responsibility to lower decision level while stimulating a sense of ownership are important criteria. The management of browneld projects is looking for an interdisciplinary project team approach, to promote and manage stakeholders participation and facilitates efcient project delivery when regarded as sustainable. A framework for transparency in decisions, ow of information and improved communication structures, the protection of human health and safety as well as the environment during site operations are further criteria for sustainability objectives. Last but not least: the adoption of an approach that integrates social, economic and environmental aspects. Indicators have been identied to measure, in both quantitative and qualitative terms, the degree of compliance with the above objectives. A critical review of existing indicator frameworks (e.g. the Pressure-State-Responseframework of the OECD; the Driving Force-State-Response-framework of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development; the Driving Force-Pressures-States-Impacts and Responses assessment framework of the European Environment Agency, European Common Indicators; City compatibility and sustainability of land uses of the German Federal Ministry of Education and ResearchBMBF; Environmental Assessment of Regional Development Plans and EU Structural Funds programmes (SEA Handbook)) concluded that existing frameworks were not a suitable basis for the development of indicators for sustainable browneld regeneration. The existing indicator sets are not applicable for the spatial scope of brownelds, and only few indicators, if any, describe issues related to browneld regeneration. Indicators are being seen as a tool in urban planning. The UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs published a new set of sustainable development indicators in 2005, including 68 indicators in four priority areas: . . . . Sustainable consumption and production; Climate change and energy; Natural resource protection and environmental enhancement; Sustainable communities (Defra 2005).

However, up to now in most cases indicators are used only for evaluation of the situation and processes. The indicators are not really integrated into decision making processes (Birkmann 2003). The RESCUE-approach tries to integrate the sustainability indicators into the early decision making processes of browneld regeneration projects by making them the basis for funding decisions. The tool, which should make this possible, is the Sustainability Assessment Tool (SAT) (RESCUE 2004a). 5. The RESCUE case studies Eight sites were analysed on the basis of the theoretical framework of the objectives and indicators. They are Loisinord and Les Tertiales-Forgeval in France, Radbod and Espenhain in Germany, Dolomites Sports Valley and Sosnowiec Coal Mine in Poland, Markham Willows and Gateshead Quays in the UK. In addition, each thematic Work Package of

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RESCUE analysed a further set of external examples that had particular relevance to the objectives of the Work Package. The case studies analyses were conducted by the relevant RESCUE-partners of each country, which are listed in the endnotes of this paper. Each Work Package has developed a questionnaire to gather information about current practices in browneld regeneration. These questionnaires were structured along a rst version of the aforementioned sustainability objectives. The national teams contacted relevant people with expert knowledge about the case study sitesfor example the project developer, local politicians, members of municipal planning departments and site ownersand conducted a series of in-person and telephone interviews on the basis of these questionnaires. The number of eight diverse case studies does not provide sufcient statistical comparable data, so the analysis has a qualitative character. The compiled data was checked against the previously dened objectives and indicators to see how the projects fared in terms of sustainability (RESCUE 2004b). The analysis of current practices in browneld regeneration revealed that implementation of sustainability objectives such as social acceptance to the characteristics of the site have been considered only inadequately. Subsequently, the case studies were analysed in terms of sustainability in order to highlight specic strengths, weaknesses and gaps in the respective management of browneld regeneration. Therefore, the potential contributions, which tools and procedures supplied for the achievement of the RESCUE sustainability objectives were checked. It is not the intention of this paper to present these good practices, tools and procedures. These results were already published in the RESCUE Manual (Edwards et al. 2005). The results showed that there is no best practice example for all aspects of sustainability. Referring to the question What denes the quality of derelict land recycling? the answer is: the above mentioned sustainability objectives are not equally relevant for all browneld sites and locations. Their relative importance also varies from location to location and also from stakeholder perspective to stakeholder perspective. A land use, design or construction methodology that proved to be sustainable at one site is not necessarily appropriate for another site, context, time or mix of stakeholders with a different set of priorities. Thus, RESCUE rejected the concept of developing a xed tool such as a checklist with quantitative indicators intended to be universally valid for all sites in all regions. Answers to questions such as what kind of land use is appropriate or sustainable on a given site (public park? shopping centre? housing development? manufacturing plant?) depend on the spatial and socio-economic context of the site and also on the person answering the question. Social acceptance is difcult to operationalize. It includes ethic components, which refer to the question what makes life good for the different individuals. Thus, these questions can only be answered by the members of the community itself (Habermas 1981). For example an unemployed person may rank job creation higher than a pensioner living close to the site who may prioritize public open space. This means that sustainability cannot be dened generally for all browneld projects. The above mentioned questions have to be rather answered on a site by site case including the views of the relevant stakeholders. This is in compliance with the guiding theme for communicative planning. The focus lies on communication among each other to achieve changes (Selle 1996). 6. The Sustainability Assessment Tool RESCUE developed the Sustainability Assessment Tool for browneld regeneration projects (SAT) to assess future browneld regeneration projects in terms of site/local specic sustainability and thereby support future funding and/or permission decisions in browneld projects.

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There are three steps to assess the sustainability of a browneld redevelopment project: 1. Actor collaboration to set priorities on aspects of sustainability: the relative importance of the objectives has to be dened for each individual browneld projectthe actors have to set priorities on aspects of sustainability. Funding/permission application by the project developer: on the basis of the weighted aspects of sustainability and all sustainability objectives the project developer elaborates a funding/permission application. Quantied assessment model (QAM) for decision making: the application has to be assessed by a funding institution and/or permission authority. This institution will have to judge how sustainable the project is and how the public priorities were taken into account.

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The SAT uses various questionnaires. The rst one is required to nd out the priorities of the actors on aspects of sustainability, and is named Actor Collaboration Questionnaire. It includes weighting questions for the workshop participants with regard to infrastructure development and planning measures (referring basically to the issues of management of existing buildings and infrastructure as well as sustainable land use and urban design on browneld sites). The second questionnaire is compiling all RESCUE sustainability objectives and or indicators, which are to be addressed by the project developer in the form of statements, situation descriptions, and planned measures. The questionnaires are an integral part of the SAT. The order of events can be seen in Figure 2. In order to produce sustainable outcomes a tool to set priorities on aspects of sustainability has to comprise three closely linked aspects: selection of participants, mode of decision making, and quality of the process. The actor collaboration to set priorities on aspects of sustainability includes the selection and integration of relevant actors (who?), the prioritization of aspects of sustainability (what?) and the evaluation of the process (how?). There is a need for neutral coordinators. The coordinators would be responsible to control the composition of participants and to facilitate the prioritization of objectives according to participation quality standards. To maintain the impartiality of the coordinators their manner has to be valuated by the different actors at the end of the workshop. This can be done in form of a letter or a questionnaire. The results of this survey have to be send to the funding institution. Additionally to the core actors (owners of the site, investors, developers, etc.) a diversity of participants is needed for the workshop, recognizing that actors can be individuals, social groups, organizations, etc. The actors have to set priorities on aspects of sustainability. Surely, there are different techniques or combinations of techniques to get case specic information. The question is which of these techniques full the criteria for a sustainable process? In the given complexity of browneld regeneration a workshop with face-to-face communication is regarded as the most efcient approach. On this platform the whole range of problems, solutions and ideas can be identied, discussed and shaped (Selle 1996). In order to achieve sustainable results it is necessary to make different problem views and priorities understandable for each other party. Only when arguments and reasons for each others choices are understood, the search for the most appropriate solution for the local context integrating the different actors interests can be successful. This procedure clearly has characteristics of a bargaining process with the objective to result in a win-win outcome. Moreover the direct contact creates a high degree of transparency. A workshop also increases the commitment of the participants, and it gives the planning process faces and identities behind the documents.

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Figure 2. Overview: the SAT-procedure.

The participatory process will not be taking place at the theoretical level of the sustainability dimensions. Rather, the different actors will have in mind the specic site, quarter, city or region (Mensch 2001). Thus, this individual background will inuence the discussion and the decisions. Nevertheless, the participants of the process should not discuss the detailed land use of the sitethis would overload the workshop, but on the level of the sustainability objectives and different aspects of the objectives that should be achieved on the site/in the quarter/in the city/in the region. The participatory process to set priorities on the different aspects of sustainability should take place in a workshop at an early stage of the project, e.g. when only a preliminary project concept exists. The participatory process of such a workshop is not necessarily time consuming, because it can reduce conicts and prevent the responsible persons (investors, developers, politicians) from overlooking the needs, chances and threats of the development of a site. It should also be taken into account that the risk of delay or total failure due to opposition against the project is reduced. Other benets for investors, planners and developers are: . . . the possibility to apply for public funding from a certain programme; an increased planning security, a long term planning horizon; an additional chance to promote the project;

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a chance to improve the project approach according to local needs which can save time and money for marketing and conict resolution (precaution is always cheaper than reparation); and to have a well structured participatory process which is more target orientated.

All these aspects can save money for marketing and conict resolution. The tool also offers benets for the citizens as they get the possibility to inuence the project from a very early stage of the project. The tool will help to reach more sustainable results than other selection tools, because: . . . . the project can base on a denition of sustainability that reects the special situation of the site concerning the local and regional context and the time; a set of sustainability objectives for browneld regeneration contexts formulated by international and interdisciplinary (RESCUE) experts forms the foundation; the stakeholders get the chance to participate; in a transparent process they can check if their objectives are represented; the participants nally assess the objectives in a discussion process, i.e. they have the chance to reect their own position and to understand other positions; they learn from each other, which in the long run increases the understanding of democracy. The SAT also has some limitations: . . to be effective, the SAT should be used in an early stage of the project: if it is used for a more advanced project, it serves for evaluation purposes; if the project developer does not commit, and is seen to commit, himself to the principles of the RESCUE approach, the results of the SAT can be, perceived to be, biased. If the project developer tries to abuse the SAT he can do so, e.g. by selecting only those stakeholders supportive of his interests; the SAT workshop produces costs. These should be assessed carefully against the risks (and costs) of failure or delay of an unsustainable project; as the proposed procedure requires a relevant amount of money, work and time, this tool is designed for browneld regeneration projects of a certain scale.

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Not all sustainability objectives can be weighted. The objectives concerning the management of contamination and reuse of soil and debris cannot be weighted as they have to be achieved (e.g. health and safety plan) and are regarded as a general quality standard for (sustainable) browneld regeneration projects. The objectives concerning sustainable planning processes and methods for citizen participation and tools for the management of browneld projects are dening the sustainability quality of the planning process. Therefore, only the objectives concerning the management of existing buildings, infrastructure, sustainable land use and urban design on browneld sites should be weighted (e.g. commercial use versus housing etc.). There are different levels of priorities that make sense to get from the participants of the workshop. For example, in the Sustainable land use and urban design on browneld sites weighting questions do not only ask for the priorities on the different objectives, but also to allocate points in checklists. A good example is Objective 4.4: To achieve benets for and prevent adverse impacts on the local neighbourhood. For this objective the Actor Collaboration Questionnaire includes the following checklist (Figure 3). It is very important to know about the priorities of the participants of the workshop on this detailed level. If the question is only focussing on the need for benets everybody will

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Figure 3. Example for a weighting question.

agree, but in order to achieve usable results the benets need to be specied. Therefore, checklists were developed for all the objectives, which should be weighted. The participants of the workshop need to prioritize the variations on this detailed level objective by objective. The prioritizing procedure in the workshop has different steps. The main steps of the procedure can be seen in Figure 2. Every group lls in the questionnaire. Most of the weighting questions are designed as allocation questions: the stakeholder has to allocate points in order to weight the relevance of several given answers. This technique delivers data which can be easily analysed and transferred into results that are objectively measurable. The prioritization of the aspects in the questionnaire is discussed till everybody within a certain stakeholder group is satised with the scoring. If this is not possible, they have to vote and the average number is taken as the group points. The project developer prepares the funding/permission application on the basis of the weighted objectives. The funding/permission application must comprise statements and measures concerning all sustainability objectives, underpinned by the indicators. Additionally, the developer has the opportunity to qualitatively explain the way his project implements the objectives, arguing why e.g. 40% surface sealing (as an example for an indicator) is regarded as sustainable on a certain site. The purpose of the qualitative explanation is, in the case of the surface sealing indicator as well as for all the other indicators, it cannot be generally said that high density developments (as they protect soil off the site) are more sustainable than low density developments (as they protect soil on the site) or the other way round. This has to be decided case by case. The pure gure might not give enough information to the assessor, thus, creating a lack of transparency about decisions taken by the project developer.

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If the developer neglects or bypasses the outcomes of the workshop, he needs to justify his decision in the application towards the funding institution and/or permission authority. This institution will decide if the developer has good reasons or otherwise turn the application down. The funding/permission application for a browneld project has to be assessed by a funding institution or a permission authority. The third stage of the SAT, the Quantied Assessment Model (QAM) to aid decision-making, takes these weightings and converts them into workable standardized data. The evaluator (working on behalf of the funding institution or permission authority) weights the various elements of the projects according to the qualitative arguments and explanations provided by the project developer. The two sets of weightings (actors and evaluators) are then used to calculate the total project score. In this way it becomes possible to benchmark the sustainability of the project as a whole without generally benchmarking individual indicators. The results emerging from the QAM form the basis of whether the funding application process for the project is successful or not. The target of the QAM is to check in a standardized way, if a browneld regeneration project achieves a certain sustainability benchmark. The decision to provide funding for projects, which achieve this benchmark and therefore full the sustainability standard of the funding institution lies outside of the SAT. The question arises why the citizens do not get the complete decision about the assessment of sustainability and the involving funding decision. But neither from experts nor from citizens can the implementation of sustainability be expected: only legitimized institutions can be the agents/advocates of the future. This is the limit of deregulation and citizen participation if they do not want to end up in the impasses of state and market failure. In the same way as companies citizens will possibly give priority to their short-term interests. In most cases this will happen at the expense of the long term sustainability. The sensible claim for deregulation and decentralization has to be bounded where problems like environmental hazards, unemployment and poverty cannot be combated bottom up. Therefore, an institution that has the power to balance the different interests is needed (Hauermann and Siebel 1987). This is taken into account in the SAT by structuring the workshop with a set of sustainability objectives elaborated by experts and by giving the funding institution/permission authority only a helping tool to decide without overbearing their decision. The integration of participation in the funding decision process does not mean any loss in control for the relevant institutions. The inuence is not narrow but different from traditional decision making (Mayntz 1997). The Sustainability Assessment Tool was tested in a trial at the Mine Radbod in Hamm, Germany, in June 2004. The trial was used to check the practical applicability of the results of the SAT, which had been elaborated so far. The participants of the trial were representatives of the regeneration project Radbod. As the project Radbod is today almost nished, it was organized as a role-play. The participants were the original actors involved in the project. The applicability of the SAT was valued by the participants as to be complete. But the participants recommended that the wordings and structure of the ACQ needs to be simplied. The questions must be dened understandable for laypersons. A leeway for interpretation of the questions must not be left. The next step to improve the SAT was a study carried out by the Land Quality Management Group (LQM) at the University of Nottingham in 2005. This study focused on the application of the Actor Collaboration Questionnaire (ACQ) to evaluate the perception of the sustainable re-use of the site. Similar to the trial in Hamm the participants recommended to provide an explanation or meaning of certain terminologies, words and their functionalities used in the ACQ (Unigbe 2005).

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In the meantime the SAT has been edited according to the recommendations: possible misunderstandings in the questions were averted and formulations for an easier understanding were used. 7. SAT in practice In 2004 the SAT was applied in the Polish cities Sosnowiec and Bytom for the sustainability assessment of the proposed regeneration of two former mines. In these cases it was combined with the self styled best practice methodology developed by the Katowice Central Mining Institute (GIG) (Sokol 2005). In the two case studies the GIG and the Voivodship Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management in Katowice modied the SAT to exclude some aspects of citizen participation. This denitely limits the signicance concerning sustainability. Instead, it was combined with a system of sustainability benchmarks. The decision was reached by the Voivodship Fund for Environmental Protection and Water Management (Sokol 2005). The use of xed benchmarks limits the transferability to other regions. In 2005 the REVIT (Towards more effective and sustainable Browneld Revitalization Policies) project put the RESCUE Sustainability Assessment Workshop into practice. The REVIT project is part of the Interreg III B programme. The aim of the programme is to strengthen economic and social coherence. This is achieved by cross border international and interregional cooperation, and by promoting the revitalization of browneld sites. In October 2005 a workshop was implemented at the REVIT-site Guterbahnhof Bad Cannstadta former goods station in Stuttgart (Langer et al. 2006). The REVIT approach used in Stuttgart and the RESCUE approach only differ in the relative timing of the workshop and the composition of its participants. While the RESCUE approach features a workshop at a very early stage of the project, i.e. at a time when an idea has been conceived but no master plan has been developed yet, the REVIT workshop is held after all major aspects of the project have been dened in principle on the political level. Most of the participantsaltogether 100of the REVIT workshop were experts from various elds. The residents side was represented by no more than eight members of a citizens initiative. Presentations and discussions were held at a level that was not really suited to a lay audience. Like in the GIG-SAT (Sokol 2005) this can limit the condence of the sustainability evaluation. Conversely, the RESCUE approach assumes that target selection should be based on a gathering of technical experts, decision-makers, and citizens from various backgrounds. While the discussion in the RESCUE approach is intended to be conned to objectives, part of the discussion in Stuttgart dealt with indicators as well (Franz and Okuniek 2006). The objectives and indicators were dened specically for the site of the former goods station and these indicators were partly already combined with benchmarks. The table SAT in practice confronts the original SAT-approach with the approaches in Katowice and Stuttgart (Figure 4). The differences in the three approaches show that the use and the further development of the SAT is clearly a learning process. However, it is a good example how research results get into practice. 8. Conclusions Particularly in former industrial regions, much browneld regeneration relies on public intervention to proceed let alone be economically viable (Thornton et al. 2005). The possibilities for public funding are limited. RESCUE recommends that publicand specically

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Figure 4. SAT in practice.

European Unionfunding for browneld regeneration projects should be predicated upon a presumption that sustainability objectives will be adhered to. This would be a remarkable innovation and could contribute signicantly to a more efcient use of public money and to an improvement in the quality of browneld regeneration projects. Sustainability is a description of an effectively never ending process that balances environmental, economic, social and institutional dimensions. In the context of browneld regeneration, short term concerns about construction methods and materials and long term issues such as land use and future land use possibilities require simultaneous evaluation for sustainability to be predicted in advance. Sustainable Browneld Regeneration is the management, rehabilitation and return to benecial use of brownelds in such a manner as to ensure the attainment and continued satisfaction of human needs for present and future generations in environmentally sensitive, economically viable, institutionally robust and socially acceptable ways within the particular regional context. (RESCUE 2003). The Sustainability Assessment Tool (SAT) has been developed to assist decision makers and public fund managers in particularevaluate the likelihood that a particular regeneration scheme will last and not have unacceptable impacts. The SAT is being trialled and rened in different European regions. Updates on developments are obtainable from www.rescue-europe.com.

9. Endnotes The content of this publication is based on the results of RESCUE (www.rescueeurope.com), and is a result of considerable team input: Montan-Grundstucksgesellschaft mbH, Essen, Germany; Umweltbundesamt, Berlin, Germany; Zentrum fur interdisziplinare Ruhrgebietsforschung der Ruhr-Universitat Bochum, Germany; Projektgruppe Stadt Entwicklung, Leipzig, Germany; ExSite Projects, Leeds, UK; University of Nottingham, Land Quality Management Group, School of Geography, Nottingham, UK; University of Wales Cardiff, Geoenvironmental Research Centre, Cardiff, UK; Mission Bassin Minier Nord-Pas de Calais, Oignies, France; Bureau de Recherches Geologiques et Minieres, Environment and Process Division Orleans, France; Universite des Sciences `

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et Technologies de Lille, Laboratoire de Sedimentologie et Geodynamique, Villeneuve DAscq, France; Central Mining Institute, National Centre for Implementation of Cleaner Production, Katowice, Poland; Municipality of Bytom, Poland; Municipality of Sosnowiec, Poland.

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