Generating a New Evaluating System for Regional Scale Redevelopment Effectiveness of Brownfields in Waterloo Region Using a Multi-Criteria Analysis Mechanism

Brownfield redevelopment has been a popular topic as part of the contemporary planning literature. Encouraging brownfields’ redevelopment and improving the redevelopment effectiveness and efficiency have been two of the top concerns for planners. Redevelopments with various purposes can benefit the region in different ways. It is not necessary that redeveloping into the most common purpose would make the greatest contribution to the region. A region-wide redevelopment projects’ effectiveness evaluation will help planners have a better understanding of the region’s current situation in terms of brownfield redevelopment. This research aims to integrate a multi-criteria analysis method with brownfield redevelopment effectiveness evaluation, with the intention of suggesting improvements to brownfield redevelopment resource allocation and enlightening regional land use efficiency. During the first phase of this study, a database was generated for previously redeveloped brownfields within Waterloo Region to fill in the informational gap of region-wide redevelopment projects. During the second phase, criteria were selected that can represent redevelopments’ influences, and a multi-criteria analysis technique was used to generate a region-wide effectiveness evaluation model. The redevelopment projects in Waterloo Region have been assessed by this evaluation model. This study not only creates an information database for redeveloped brownfields in Waterloo Region, but also provides an effectiveness ranking for previous redevelopment projects and identifies the best and worst performing projects. Based on the effectiveness evaluation, the region’s performance in terms of brownfield redevelopment can also be analyzed. Waterloo Region has planning tools and policies available to provide legal and technical advice for potential developers of brownfield sites. At the same time, different levels of financial supports, such as grants and tax incentive programs, are also available in Waterloo Region. However, a lack of monitoring and evaluation of programs after redevelopments is Waterloo Region’s shortcoming. In terms of brownfield redevelopment, efficiently allocating supportive resources would be the key for the region’s next step. The region-wide brownfield repurposing activities’ effectiveness evaluation could be a start that draws attention to development of efficient brownfield redevelopment resources allocation tools in the future

Smart urban development suitability analysis based on power utility infrastructure capacity : a case of City of Johannesburg

Abstract: The assessment and understanding of spatial energy patterns play a critical contribution for the overall planning of smart-energy efficiency solutions within cities. This study therefore seeks to project a model that structures the City of Johannesburg’s planning efforts to practice smart spatial energy initiatives of optimization and efficiency regarding the power utility sector in relation to the city growth. In doing this, the background pertaining to the city’s efforts in adopting smart energy principle was key in overseeing the general status quo and exertions. Overlapping from this was the assessment of the synergy between land use and form with spatial energy. Using three time-series satellite scenes (Landsat TM (2000 and 2008) and ETM+ (2017)), clarification pertaining to how the city had developed in relation to the spatial energy was possible and key as the projection of where future growth was most likely to take place, was invigorated and to an extent, informed the subsequent modelling analysis. The analysis of the data revealed the efforts of the city in attaining smart energy principles, however, these efforts lack institutional support across all spheres. Additional analysis regarding the synergy of land use and built form in relation to the city’s spatial energy point out to how the majority of the built form within Region F is under-capacitated. Most of the densified land uses are central – with Region D accounting the most. This has serious implications regarding future energy supply and demand dynamics that the city has to address. The model with the urban growth projection for the year 2047 was generated using the IDRISI software. This served as a functional framework for the model and the growth generated was predominantly densely central and located towards the northern regions where access to power was abundant and efficient. The overall findings of the research seek to provide contributions to the field of urban planning in understanding the dynamics between spatial energy and urban growth.M.A. (Sustainable Urban Planning and Development

Development of the methodology for construction and evaluation of composite indicators

Предмет истраживања докторске дисертације је даљи развој методологије за формирање и евалуацију композитних индикатора креиране од стране експерата из Организације за економску сарадњу и развој (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development – ОЕЦД) и Обједињеног истраживачког центра (Јoint Research Center – ЈРЦ). Композитни индикатори су метрике формиране од агрегираних појединачних пондерисаних индикатора који мере различите аспекте посматраног вишедимензионалног концепта. Доносиоци одлука све више користе композитне индикаторе за рангирање и евалуацију ентитета у различитим областима живота. ОЕЦД-ЈРЦ методологија пружа корисне смернице за спровођење комплексног процеса формирања методолошког оквира композитног индикатора. Међутим, начин додељивања тежинских коефицијената и анализа робусности и анализа осетљивости су кораци методологије који и даље привлаче пажњу. Циљ методе додељивања тежинских коефицијената предложене у овој докторској дисертацији је одређивање тежинских коефицијената који максимизују стабилност метрике, мерену сумом стандардних девијација релативних доприноса индикатора. За дефинисање ограничења модела предложено је комбиновање методе реузорковања и Ивановићевог одстојања (И-одстојање), док је за решавање дефинисаног оптимизационог модела коришћена метахеуристика унапређено распршено претраживање (enhanced Scatter Search – еСС). Нова метода узима у обзир стабилност композитног индикатора већ приликом одређивања тежинских коефицијената и предлаже тежинске коефицијенте засноване на подацима, чиме се смањује степен интуитивности методе и превазилази чињеница да се анализа робусности често не спроводи у процесу формирања и евалуације композитних индикатора. Сходно резултатима истраживања, показано је да се предложена метода може са успехом применити у процесу формирања и евалуације композитних индикатора.The subject of this doctoral dissertation is further development of the methodology for construction and evaluation of composite indicators created by experts from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the Joint Research Center (JRC). Composite indicators are metrics formed when individual indicators that measure different aspects of the observed multidimensional concept are weighted and aggregated. Decision makers increasingly use composite indicators to rank and evaluate entities on various topics. The OECD-JRC methodology provides useful guidelines for the complex process of construction the methodological framework of the composite indicator. However, the weighting method and the robustness and sensitivity analysis are the steps of the methodology that continue to attract attention. The aim of the weighting method proposed in this doctoral dissertation is to determine the weighting scheme which maximizes the stability of the metric, measured by the sum of standard deviations of relative contributions of indicators. In order to define the model constraints the bootstrap Ivanović distance (I-distance) is proposed, while the metaheuristics enhanced Scatter Search (eSS) is used to solve the defined optimization problem. The new method takes into account the stability of the composite indicator during the process of weighting scheme determination and proposes a data-driven weighting scheme which reduces the level of intuitivity and overcomes the fact that the robustness analysis is often not conducted in the process of construction and evaluation of composite indicators. According to the experimental results, it is shown that the proposed weighting method can be successfully applied in the process of construction and evaluation of composite indicators