Brownfield Redevelopment Query Model Based on Socioeconomic Conditions

Abstract Redeveloping brownfields can be considered an important step in regional urban development. With breakthroughs in information technology, Taiwan has established a number of open databases, this study uses these open datasets of regional socioeconomic and environmental geo-information to develop a regional SDG map and screen suitable brownfield locations for redevelopment. This study designs Brownfield Redevelopment Query (BRQ) model that combines big data socioeconomic geographic information to link with sustainable potentiality for evaluating benefit-cost ratios (BCR). Land stakeholders can obtain useful information prior to brownfield investment. The flexible user interface design is useful to explore the outcomes of BCR (consolidation, internalities, and externalities) for four land-use scenarios (residential, industrial, commercial, and renewable energy facilities) of brownfield redevelopment. The brownfield redevelopment BCR is positively dominated by the operating profits in the reuse stage for two contaminated sites. Besides, the externalities BCR value of the studied cases is positive, particularly in converting the residential land if the site is located at level 4 and level 5 of the SDG map. Consequently, this study uses a large quantity of transparent information and flexible user interface design to develop a useful evaluation tool and to reduce the possible pitfalls associated with brownfield redevelopment for land stakeholders.