Redevelopment

Key takeaways

Redevelopment belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Redevelopment to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Redevelopment from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Redevelopment is any new construction on a site that has pre-existing uses. It represents a process of land development uses to revitalize the physical, economic and social fabric of urban space.

Description Variations on redevelopment include:

Urban infill on vacant parcels that have no existing activity but were previously developed, especially on brownfield land, such as the redevelopment of an industrial site into a mixed-use development. Constructing with a denser land usage, such as the redevelopment of a block of townhouses into a large apartment building. Adaptive reuse, where older structures are converted for improved current market use, such as an industrial mill into housing lofts. Redevelopment projects can be small or large ranging from a single building to entire new neighborhoods or "new town in town" projects. Redevelopment also refers to state and federal statutes which give cities and counties the authority to establish redevelopment agencies and give the agencies the authority to attack problems of urban decay. The fundamental tools of a redevelopment agency include the authority to acquire real property, the power of eminent domain, to develop and sell property without bidding and the authority and responsibility of relocating persons who have interests in the property acquired by the agency. The financing/funding of such operations might come from government grants, borrowing from federal or state governments and selling bonds and from tax increment financing. Other terms sometimes used to describe redevelopment include urban renewal (urban revitalization). While efforts described as urban revitalization often involve redevelopment, they do not always involve redevelopment as they do not always involve the demolition of any existing structures but may instead describe the rehabilitation of existing buildings or other neighborhood improvement initiatives. A new example of other neighborhood improvement initiatives is the funding mechanism associated with high carbon footprint air quality urban blight. Assembly Bill AB811 is the State of California's answer to funding renewable energy and allows cities to craft their own sustainability action plans. These cutting edge action plans needs the funding structure; which can easily come forward through redevelopment funding.

Urban renewal

Some redevelopment projects and programs have been incredibly controversial including the urban renewal program in the United States in the mid-twentieth century or the urban regeneration program in Great Britain. Controversy usually results either from the use of eminent domain, from objections to the change in use or increases in density and intensity on the site or from disagreement on the appropriate use of taxpayer funds to pay for some element of the project. Urban redevelopment in the United States has been controversial because it can displace poor and lower middle class residents, often transferring residents' land and homes to developers for free or a below-market-value price. This is done on the condition that the developer will use that land to construct new commercial and residential developments. The residents displaced by redevelopment are often undercompensated, and some (notably month-to-month tenants and business owners) are not compensated at all. Historically, redevelopment agencies have been buying many properties in redevelopment areas for prices below fair market value, or even below the agencies' own appraisal figures because the displaced people are often unaware of their legal rights and lack the will and the funds to mount a proper legal defense in a valuation trial. Those who do so usually recover more in compensation than what is offered by the redevelopment agencies. The controversy over misuse of eminent domain for redevelopment reached a climax in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court's 2005 decision in Kelo v. City of New London, which ruled that the general benefits a community enjoyed from economic growth qualified private redevelopment plans as a permissible "public use" under the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment. The Kelo decision was widely denounced and remains the subject of severe criticism. Remedial legislation to restrict the use of eminent domain for private development has been enacted or introduced in a number of states.

Golf course redevelopment Golf course redevelopment, also known as golf course conversion, is a real estate niche, in which investors purchase failing golf courses. Investors then subdivide the golf course into individual plots of lands. They then resell the plots of land for builders, or build on the plots then resell it to residential home buyers. This process is usually done with the assistance of a real estate broker. The main challenge of this niche is the difficulties that investors face in requesting a variance from cities.

Notable examples

North America:

Atlantic Station, Atlanta, Georgia Atlantic Yards, Brooklyn, New York American Tobacco Historic District, Durham, North Carolina CFB Downsview -> Downsview Park, Toronto, Ontario CFB Griesbach -> Griesbach, Edmonton, Alberta CN rail yard -> Station Lands (Edmonton), MacEwan University, Edmonton downtown arena; Edmonton, Alberta Edmonton City Centre (Blatchford Field) Airport -> Blatchford, Edmonton, Alberta HOPE VI Hudson Yards, New York, New York Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, New York, New York Midtown Detroit, Michigan Mission Bay, Treasure Island, Western Addition, and the part of South of Market that become Moscone Center and Yerba Buena Gardens in San Francisco, California Pearl District, Portland, Oregon New Stadium at RFK Campus, Washington, D.C. Old Port of Montreal, Quebec Downtown San Diego, California Central Park, Denver, Colorado, on a former airport site Toronto Waterfront, Toronto, Canada West End, Boston, Massachusetts World Trade Center site in Lower Manhattan following the September 11 attacks Europe:

Canary Wharf, London (UK) Edinburgh Waterfront, UK Redevelopment of Norrmalm (Sweden) Liverpool One, Liverpool (UK) Greenwich Millennium Village, London (UK) Tigné Point, Sliema (Malta) Porta Nuova, Milan (Italy) Asia:

Taichung's seventh Redevelopment Zone, Taichung, Taiwan Beijing Olympic Village, Beijing, China Sheung Wan, Hong Kong, China Central America:

Panama in Casco Antiguo (Casco Viejo)

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Redevelopment

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Redevelopment claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Redevelopment before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Redevelopment ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Redevelopment

In research: Redevelopment appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Redevelopment in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Redevelopment is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Redevelopment, Urban decay, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Redevelopment outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

How to study Redevelopment in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Redevelopment means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Redevelopment out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Redevelopment in simple terms?

Redevelopment is any new construction on a site that has pre-existing uses. It represents a process of land development uses to revitalize the physical, economic and social fabric of urban space.

Why does Redevelopment matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Redevelopment?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Redevelopment.