[CPEO-BIF] Reflections on European brownfield policy

["Robert Hersh" <b_hersh@verizon.net>]

At CPEO, we have been posting various articles about brownfields policy in
Europe.  To add to our coverage of emerging European trends, Kris Wernstedt
of Virginia Tech, gives his impressions of the largest European brownfields
conference, which took place in Stuttgart a few weeks ago.  We hope
Kris' report generates discussion and that other CPEO listserv subscribers
will post reports, comments, initial research findings, and queries.  

To download Kris' report as a formatted 44K MS Word file, go to
http://www.cpeo.org/pubs/CABERNET.doc.

Bob Hersh
CPEO
**************** 


Impressions from CABERNET*

Kris Wernstedt
May, 2007

The Second International Conference on Managing Urban Land took place in
Stuttgart, Germany in late April 2007. I was lucky enough to attend this
major European brownfields meeting. While only one tenth size of the 2006
national brownfields conference in Boston, the 500-plus attendees from
nearly two dozen countries in Europe and elsewhere around the world vetted
an array of ideas that shows both the limitations and the strengths of the
U.S. brownfields scene. 

What struck me most as an American?one who is admittedly a sucker for
integrated planning?was the strong regional or areawide angle of many
nations? brownfield revitalization efforts. Economic, social, and
environmental sustainability?across communities and regions?constituted the
foundation of many presentations, as well as discussions in the conference
hallways and over beers. 

Far from merely a rhetorical prop, this area-based sustainability framework
appears to guide brownfields revitalization to a far greater degree than is
the case in the US, even in Europe?s private-sector-led brownfield
developments. This clearly reflects the greater prominence of central
planning in many western European countries and different rights and
histories with respect to private property. However, I believe it also
reflects a choice that many Europeans have made to place European
brownfields in a longer-term land recycling context. The concept of
brownfields that much of the continent uses?previously used property that is
derelict or underused and requires interventions to bring it back to
use?helps broaden the appeal of revitalization and reuse since it means that
brownfield efforts need not be restricted to properties that have
contamination, or even the perception of it. 

There is much to admire and envy in European approaches, and I?ve long
thought that EPA, the states, and all of us interested in U.S. brownfields
need to think more creatively about how to move brownfields from a
highest-and-best-use, property-by-property effort to areawide
revitalization. There is some action on this here in the States, I know, but
I think Europe offers many lessons that we could harvest. Areawide
approaches in Europe, even when undertaken at the local government level,
benefit from much more robust information on the scope and characteristics
of brownfield sites, which allows for more strategic targeting of
interventions across sites. Moreover, basic monitoring of land use change
(e.g., greenfields development) in several countries encourages more efforts
to work regionally to reduce such conversions, thus generating more pressure
for brownfields reuse. Some important European stakeholders are even calling
for the development of a curriculum and formal training for ?brownfields
process managers? to tie together planning, technical, and market factors in
more visionary, proactive brownfield revitalizations. 

On the flip side, there is no utopia for brownfields across the Atlantic.
Europe faces many of the same challenges as the U.S. and thus is similarly
searching for policy responses. For example:

?	Europe appears to struggle just as much with small, upside-down
properties as does America?and its under quarter-hectare brownfield sites
appear to be as pervasive and unacknowledged as our small, under half-acre
sites. How can these be tackled collectively to overcome the high fixed
costs of individual site management and reuse? 

?	Regardless of size, sites unattractive to the market?where there is
no realistic profit potential?pose tremendous difficulties in Europe, just
as they do in the U.S. In some Western European areas undergoing
deindustrialization, such sites represent more than half of brownfield
properties. Can interim or soft-end uses be encouraged at these sites, and
what are the opportunities for land trust mechanisms and other dedicated
funds to stabilize these properties?

?	Liability can be just as chaotic in Europe as the U.S. (even with a
recent pan-European Union liability directive). And this can become even
more problematic with the multitude of public and private players involved
in brownfields, each of which may introduce additional uncertainties into a
revitalization effort. Can insurance and other tools be further developed to
better manage these liabilities and uncertainties, and does the public
sector have a role to play in longer-term contingencies that the private
market may be ill-equipped to handle? 

?	Population decline in many Western European countries presents a set
of demographic, social, and economic challenges that many older U.S. urban
areas are also encountering. There is simply far too much distressed land in
some regions for the market to absorb. This existing situation needs to be
addressed, but it also needs to be prevented from happening on such a large
scale again. Can new corporate social responsibility codes be developed to
help guide the private sector toward more responsible, long-term land
management? 

Enough problems remain in Europe, the U.S., and throughout the world for a
generation or more of brownfield stakeholders to continue to work on. If you
want a better flavor of these, practice your French and find a way in Spring
2009 to attend the Third International Conference on Managing Urban Land in
St. Étienne, 500 kilometers southeast of Paris. In the meantime, you can
check out more details on the Stuttgart conference at the website of
CABERNET, the Concerted Action on Brownfield and Economic Regeneration
Network (www.cabernet.org.uk). 

Urban Affairs and Planning
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
Alexandria Center
1021 Prince Street, Suite 200
Alexandria, Virginia 22314
703-706-8132 (voice), 703-518-8009 (fax)
krisw@vt.edu, www.uap.vt.edu/thePeople.htm


* Concerted Action on Brownfield and Economic Regeneration Network


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