Explaining Differences in Decline between Industrial Sites

In this paper we explain differences in the development of value between a designated type of urban areas: industrial sites. The aim of this paper is twofold. First, industrial sites in the Netherland are prone to rapid decline (Buitelaar & van der Krabben, 2011) and although regeneration policies to counter the effects of decline are very common (Ploegmakers & Beckers, 2012), the process of decline itself remains under researched. Secondly, existing studies on urban and neighbourhood decline usually apply qualitative methods to research decline in one city or selected areas of a few metropolitan areas (Ellen & O'Regan, 2008). For this paper, large scale quantitative methods are applied to research the influence of a variety of site specific and (regional) economic characteristics on the development of value of all industrial sites in the Netherlands.Based on existing studies on gentrification, urban decline and neighbourhood decline we argue that the development of value is a proxy for the process of decline of urban areas. It is believed that industrial sites that under perform in terms of development of value as compared to the average development have experienced more decline than sites that have performed well. The development of value in the period 1997-2008 of the industrial sites in our dataset is calculated using the aggregate of the values of individual properties on industrial sites.The conclusions of this paper provide more insight into what factors influence the process of decline. These insights can also be helpful for urban policy makers in making the present policies more efficient when it comes to both regeneration and development of new industrial sites.ReferencesEllen, I. G. and K. O'Regan (2008). Reversal of Fortunes? Lower-Income Urban Neighbourhoods in the Us in the 1990s. Urban Studies 45 (4): 845-869.Ploegmakers, H. and P. Beckers (2012) Evaluating Regeneration Policies for Rundown IndustrialSites in the Netherlands. Working Paper 8. The Hague, PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency.Van der Krabben, E. and E. Buitelaar (2011). Industrial land and property markets: market processes, market institutions and market outcomes. The Dutch Case. European Planning Studies, 19(12), 2127-2146.