Urban Redevelopment Project: Benefits and Barriers of Reusing Post-industrial Sites in the Netherlands

Generally located in advantageous locations along waterfronts or near the city or supported by existing infrastructure, post-industrial landscapes constitute environmentally impaired resources that need to be returned to productive uses, and reintegrated into the surrounding community. However, the complexity of any post-industrial redevelopment project, evident in the number of different ways in which it is described both in the literature and by designers and developers who work and/or analyse these landscapes make post-industrial redevelopment difficult to accomplish. This design project is focused around seven locations in the Zaan District, Netherlands with carefully plan to reconnect the urban tissue interrupted in time by the industrial development; considering the purpose of the present research, it was necessary to use several methods throughout the investigation, including quantitative and qualitative research methods divided in two main sections: literature review and case study research. Considering the collected data and the performed statistical analysis, it is possible to conclude that, though there are strong relationships between several of the identified benefits and barriers, the survey revealed distinct perceptions about the benefits and the barriers associated to post-industrial redevelopment, idea which is of utmost importance considering that designers tend to be primarily focused on aesthetics, leaving society's other main goals to secondary status, and that planning and landscape redevelopment activities are increasingly becoming less the result of design and more the expression of economic and sociocultural forces.