A challenge of a Brownfield Redevelopment: Identifying Real Estate Features

One of the biggest challenges in urban areas is the redevelopment of brownfields. Most of the brownfield sites are currently not fully in use or even totally vacant, derelict or contaminated. They are not available for intended use without a drastic intervention. During the decision making process the developer has to deal with a complex environmental, economic, legal, social, and land use issues. Brownfield problems are not easily to resolve and the Real Estate Features (REFs) of these sites deserve special attention. The focus is on a complex decision making process during brownfield redevelopment as well as the selection of the critical REFs by the developer. Typical real estate development assumes the existence of the institutional factors enabling investment and rewards for undertaking a project and the urban infrastructure, together regarded as REFs. There are more than a thousand factors which should be checked before the land acquisition and more than a hundred risk types involved during the process of development. They are often overlapping in their context and content. This paper introduces a qualitative technique to relate this complexity with the decision of a specific stakeholder. Quality Function Deployment (QFD) is a market oriented technique for upgrading a product value. It is used as stepping point to realize basic requirements of developers and major features of Brownfield Redevelopment (BR) area giving insights about their relationship. Further on, Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) is used as a supplement methodology for indentifying the key features. The findings - data collections, are based on interviews with professionals addressing their decision making process. We strongly support idea that using the mathematical oriented (scientific) tools will bring a step forward traditionally intuitive approach of the real estate business.