Brownfields are problems for many communities. But they also can be opportunities. Laura Solitare of Rutgers University describes her research on what engages people in redeveloping the brownfields located in their neighborhoods. Her research relies on four case studies in Boston and four in Houston.Brownfields - Massachusetts ; Brownfields - Texas

Laura Solitare

English

Research Papers in Economics

10 c & b
Participation in 
Brownfields 
Redevelopment
By Laura Solitare, Rutgers University
B
rownfields are problems for many American cities. As abandoned or
underutilized properties with real or perceived contamination,
brownfields can be eyesores that decrease neighborhood property
values. Brownfields can scare off development for both the actual site
and the surrounding neighborhood. In many older city neighborhoods,
brownfields are often found in conjunction with additional problems
including a declining economic base, high unemployment and poverty
rates, poor education systems, dilapidated infrastructure, high crime,
poor public health rates, and limited open space. 
But just as brownfields are problems, they are also opportunities. Their
cleanup and reuse have the potential to improve neighborhood residents’
overall quality of life by bringing in jobs and tax dollars, repairing dilap-
idated infrastructure, and reducing environmental and health risks.
Depending on the agenda driving the redevelopment process, however,
the benefits might be confined just to the site and have minimal advan-
tages for the residents. 
Public participation is one way to steer the agenda driving redevelop-
ment. By contributing to the decision-making process, residents and
others may feel that the end result is more fair, and that the redevelop-
ment as a whole is more successful. Currently, in hundreds of cities
across the United States, brownfields redevelopment projects are going
full-steam ahead. As I found in my research, some decision-making
about brownfields redevelopment is being done behind closed doors,
based upon the opinions and input of technical experts. Public partici-
pation is minimal. However, I also found cases of stronger participation.
This article explores the dynamics of those cases and tries to understand
what factors supported such stronger participation. It also provides some
policy recommendations.
What engages people in redeveloping the brownfields located in their neighborhoods? 
Eight cases studies in Boston and Houston provide some explanation. 
At Right: The Modern Electroplating plant operated for 40
years in Roxbury’s Dudley Square until it was shut down by
the Attorney General’s office in 1994. The three-acre
brownfield site was supposed to be redeveloped beginning
in February 2001, but it continues to sit.tamination talk to be exaggerated,
and some developers said that
minority groups were used to living
in undesirable and often unhealthy
views with people belonging to var-
ious stakeholder groups including
state and federal officials, local pub-
lic officials, residents, local business
owners, community nonprofits, and
private/big business. In Boston, the
four sites were at Amory Street
(Jamaica Plain), Bay Street (Dorchester),
Boston Center for the Arts (South
End), and Modern Electroplating
(Roxbury’s Dudley Square). Those in
Houston include the BFI landfill,
Latino Learning Center, Ormandy
Street, and Washington Courtyards. 
Expectations and 
One Big Obstacle
It seems reasonable to think that real
and perceived contamination would
spur participation in the redevelop-
ment process, but in all of the cases,
the majority of the stakeholder
groups did not view it as a big deal.
Many residents believed the con-
Background
Urban revitalization and brown-
fields redevelopment have produced
failures and successes. For the most
part, the successes are marked by a
decision-making process that max-
imizes communication between
stakeholders and produces a com-
mon vision. My motivation with
this project was to find out if and
how participation in the brown-
fields redevelopment process helped
or hindered economic development
and environmental safety. I wanted
to determine what encouraged resi-
dents to get involved in the rede-
velopment processes happening in
their neighborhoods. 
This article is based on eight case
studies of brownfields sites located
in residential neighborhoods in
Boston, Massachusetts, and Houston,
Texas. I conducted numerous inter-
It seems reasonable
to think that real
and perceived con-
tamination would
spur participation in
the redevelopment
process, but most
did not view it as a
big deal. The neighborhood was deathly afraid
of gentrification — we saw develop-
ers were eating up the South End, so
we fought the encroachment of gen-
trification. We wanted to keep out
private developers so that they
wouldn’t gentrify the area.”
Considering that environmental
safety isn’t a huge anxiety, and that
brownfields are quiet problems,
what gets people to participate in
the redevelopment process? The best
predictors are if neighborhood
organizations exist in the communi-
ty, if the initiator of the development
is an “outsider,” and if the future
reuse involves potential traffic
impacts on the neighborhood. 
The lack of concern people feel about
possible contamination is com-
pounded by my finding that most
people rank brownfields redevelop-
ment low on the list of neighborhood
priorities. It simply is not an urgent
issue — and this seems to be the
biggest obstacle to strong public par-
ticipation. While brownfields rede-
velopment is important, when resi-
dent and local business stakeholders
put it into the context of other
neighborhood issues, it usually does
not top the list. As one resident liv-
ing near the Modern Electroplating
site explains, “Modern was not a
neighborhood priority, but it was
important. At the time we were deal-
ing with other higher priority issues.
places. Only residents near Boston’s
Modern Electroplating site were
moderately concerned about health
risks from the contamination — but
even then the priority issue was not
how to clean up the site, but how to
develop it appropriately — for exam-
ple, by not putting a daycare center
on the grounds. Other residents
viewed the cleanup of a particular
site as somewhat futile. As one local
businessperson near the Modern
Electroplating site said, “How much
zeal can you have about cleaning up
the immediate site when you realize
that 300 to 500 yards outside of that
immediate area there is still contam-
ination to the level that it would
affect human life?”
12 c & b
One Brownfield Story
1. Dorchester’s Savin Hill neigh-
borhood is an historic community
that was settled before Boston
was in 1630.  
2. A five-acre piece of property at
65 Bay Street was once home to
Boston Insulated Wire and Cable
Co. The property was declared a
brownfield in 1988. Dorchester
Bay Economic Development Corp-
oration bought the property in
1994, demolished the building and
cleaned up the site. Initial plans to
lure a noodle factory to the site
fell through, however. 
3. Dorchester Bay, along with 16
other financers, then worked to
develop an 80,000 square foot
office and industrial building to
serve as the headquarters for
Spire, a marketing, graphic design,
and printing company (3). The rib-
bon cutting for the $14.5 million
project occurred in October 2002.
As Mayor Menino said at the cer-
emony, "This development project
brings this deserted site back into
productive use." 
1.
2.
3.
Photo courtesy of Laura Solitare.
Photo courtesy of Laura Solitare.
Photo courtesy of Dorchester Bay Economic Development Corporation.13 c & b
Traffic
When traffic is the topic, it seems
people can always find something to
say. Accordingly, throughout each of
the eight cases, many residents par-
ticipated in discussions about traffic
resulting from redevelopment. They
debated many issues  — such as an
increased number of vehicles, drive-
way access, pedestrian crosswalks,
and changing of street directions —
but some of the most intense discus-
sions focused on minimizing any
new truck traffic. (Most of the sites
were accessed only by narrow
streets.) As one resident living near a
Boston brownfields site said, “We
took real issues with the traffic stud-
ies. We just knew from living here
that what the traffic consultant was
saying wasn’t right. He may have
studied it for 20 or 30 hours, but
we’ve lived here for 20 to 30 years.” 
More general design issues also
engaged people, but according to
some, this involvement was at the
expense of the end result. As one
local businessperson in Boston said,
“The architecture of the project as
originally conceived has been com-
promised much to the detriment of
the project. We do not have nearly
as good-looking a project here any-
more as was originally proposed.
This is directly due to neighborhood
input. As long as the building gets
built, it is fine from a business per-
spective; but as a resident I think we
have an ugly building on our hands
and the beautiful aspects of the
building were considered too daring
and have been removed.” 
trusted each other less, their partici-
pation was stronger. This is particu-
larly true for the relationship
between the residents and the devel-
oper of the site. If residents felt as
though the developer was part of the
community, an “insider” rather than
an “outsider,” then they tended to be
more likely to trust the developer.
This made for minimal participation
that mostly focused on reuse and
redevelopment issues such as design
and traffic. As one Houston resident
put it, “We are very supportive of the
Latino Learning Center. It has been a
good neighbor — it provides services
to lots of residents. I trust them to do
this right.” But when residents felt
the developer was an outsider, then
the trust was not automatically there
and was hard to build. In these
cases, residents tended to focus on
larger issues such as how the land
would be used. 
In none of the cases did the resi-
dents have full trust in the city as a
stakeholder in the process. In partic-
ular, distrust of the Boston Redevel-
opment Authority, the lead Boston
agency involved with brownfields
redevelopment, led to increased par-
ticipation by residents in one of the
cases. In the four Houston-based
cases, trust of the city did not appear
to be a factor because residents did
not appear to have any established,
trusting or non-trusting, relationship
with the city.
Predictors of Participation
An Inclusive Environment 
Communities with active neighbor-
hood organizations (all four in
Boston and two in Houston) had
stronger participation than those
lacking such organizations. These
organizations — including general
neighborhood associations, historic
preservation groups, environmental
groups, and local business associa-
tions — have place-based missions
that focus on the activities affecting
the immediate neighborhood. Faith-
based organizations would also fit in
this group, but none were involved
in any of the eight cases. As one res-
ident near the Bay Street brownfield
said, “I think actually we are proba-
bly one of the better-organized
neighborhoods within the Boston
community as far as dealing with
development issues. I don’t know
how the BRA [Boston Redevelopment
Authority] feels about us. They
probably think that we’re the neigh-
borhood that always says no. That’s
fine with us. At least they know they
have to come to us.”
Trust
Another influential factor affecting
the strength of participation is trust
between the stakeholder groups. For
cases with active neighborhood
organizations, I found that when the
stakeholder groups were more trust-
ing of one another, the participation
was weaker. When stakeholders
If residents felt
as though the
developer was an
“insider” rather
than an “outsider,”
then they tended
to be more trust-
ing. This made for
less participation. 
Differences in Decision-Making
Decisions about brownfields redevelopment occur on a broad spectrum. On
one end, decisions are made by a small group of “experts” through an act
of guardianship. This technocratic decision-making works as a means to an
end; such decision-making is often fast. Yet it does not guarantee success.
Technocratic decisions often come face to face with public resistance and
are not implemented. 
On the other end, decisions are made through acts of direct democracy.
This can increase the public support for a particular solution and make its
implementation successful. However, one of direct democracy’s main
downsides is that it is often a time consuming and lengthy process. These
time constraints frequently deter capital, resulting in paper solutions with
no financial backing for implementation. 
Of course, these two types of decision-making are the extreme ends of the
spectrum. Most decisions are made through a process that takes place
somewhere in between.14 c & b
Some Overall Findings
From my observations, stronger par-
ticipation did not prevent one brown-
field from being redeveloped, nor did
it seem to have significantly slowed
one down. On the flipside, I am not
sure if weak participation actually
hurts the redevelopment. I could not
document any such cases. However, I
did find that late-starting participa-
tion can delay projects beyond the
developer’s initial deadline.
By conducting these interviews, it
became clear that the developer,
residents, and local business stake-
holders think of brownfields rede-
velopment in two distinct phases:
cleanup and reuse. And lack of con-
cern or participation in the cleanup
phase does not preclude these
groups from having interest in the
reuse phase. But for the public offi-
cial stakeholder group, there are no
phases. There is no distinguishing
between cleanup and reuse; it is all
part of the same redevelopment. 
So public officials reason that if
there is no interest in the cleanup,
then there will be no interest in the
reuse. This bodes poorly for resi-
dents, who, I found, would partici-
pate in brownfields redevelopment
when it focuses on the reuse, but, for
the most part, not when it focuses
on the cleanup. It also could be inju-
rious to the developer and other cap-
ital partners because delaying the
process of engaging the public can
be much more costly than engaging
them early.
Repackaging Brownfields 
My main recommendation addresses
the disconnect between cleanup and
redevelopment, which may be a
result of bureaucratic misalignment.
The brownfields redevelopment pro-
gram originates at the federal level
within the Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA), where its intent is main-
ly to decontaminate sites. In contrast,
local or state governments implement
the program with, for the most part,
intent to spur economic development.
To bridge this gap, I support a new
overall approach that promotes
brownfields redevelopment as a means
for neighborhood revitalization.
Viewing brownfields redevelopment
holistically differs from current
approaches, which tend to empha-
size environmental remediation
and/or job creation. (It should be
noted though that the jobs created
are often not for local people.) The
current approach makes it appear as
though decision-making is techni-
cal, with experts being the most
qualified to make the decisions. This
discourages layperson participation,
and it may marginalize residents
and others. In turn, these laypersons
may not realize that they actually
have a stake in the outcome until
the redevelopment process is
advanced to the point where they
feel as though their participation
would be useless.
If brownfields redevelopment is
framed from the outset as an oppor-
tunity to improve neighborhood
quality of life, improve public
health, and create local jobs and
other opportunities, then local resi-
dents and other affected stakehold-
ers may realize the potential impacts
on their lives and want to be part of
the decision-making. Getting early
involvement from residents and oth-
ers may make the redevelopment
process less contentious, which in
turn means it may proceed more
quickly and be more cost efficient
for the developer. Early involvement
can also mean that the project will
be more representative of what the
neighborhood wants. 
To redevelop brownfields in a way
that benefits all involved and spurs
enthusiasm, the EPA and other fed-
eral, state, and local government
agencies could begin by attempting
to redefine how they market brown-
fields redevelopment. The U.S. De-
partment of Housing and Urban
Development (HUD), an agency that
focuses on redevelopment, could
become the lead federal agency in
brownfields redevelopment. HUD
could partner with the EPA to
assure that environmental issues
are thoroughly addressed; however,
HUD would need to continue to
assure that redevelopment issues
are kept at the forefront of brown-
fields redevelopment. In addition,
HUD and EPA could provide local
governments with resources to
enable residents and other stake-
holders to participate in the rede-
velopment decision-making. 
Regardless of what bureaucratic
changes take place, neighborhood
groups can be important players in
turning the problems of brown-
fields into opportunities. These
neighborhood groups are important
in getting people involved in
brownfields redevelopment, but
they may struggle to get participa-
tion because brownfields are not
viewed by most people as dreadful
problems that require immediate
attention. If neighborhood groups
desire participation for the sense of
empowerment it gives residents,
they may have to work hard in cases
where the developer is trusted, and
traffic problems are minor.  
Laura Solitare is a lecturer at the
Edward J. Bloustein School of Plan-
ning and Public Policy at Rutgers
University, where she recently earned
her Ph.D.
Stronger participa-
tion did not prevent
one brownfield from
being redeveloped,
nor did it seem to
have significantly
slowed one down.

Participation in brownfields redevelopment

http://www.bostonfed.org/commdev/c&b/2003/winter/Brownfields.pdf

Participation in brownfields redevelopment

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