Construction of Sustainability and Real Estate Finance and Development

Research focus

The Peer review has evaluated this group as Average

The Research Group deals with the construction and evaluation of social, environmental and economic sustainability, economic appraisals of urban systems and built-up environments and real estate development and finance. The Research Group focuses on the implementation of tools, methods and techniques for real estate development and finance, in order to steer decision making processes towards sustainable development principles through all steps of the project life cycle, both public and private (market analysis, needs assessment, programming, pre-design, design, construction, management, monitoring). In more detail, the research topics cover: a) real estate finance and urban development processes; b) evaluation and urban planning and policies; c) project sustainability and built environment assessment; d) cultural heritage and environmental assets appraisal; e) territorial marketing and branding; f) Life cycle costing and cost management. Real estate finance and urban development processes On this topic, the research group focuses on the legal, technical and economic feasibility of strategic real estate developments with reference to options analysis in order to calculate the financial sustainability of both public and private project investments. The main issues of this research topic are: real estate portfolio strategy and optimization, current and forecast profitability valuations, profitability analysis, profitability valuation for building areas, abandoned sites and buildings to be upgraded, feasibility studies and business plans. Evaluation and urban planning and policies The Research Group is involved in a national publicly-funded research project into Evaluating and Monitoring development processes in large urban brownfields. The main goal of this project is to understand the role of evaluation in urban planning and in setting policies and programs by needs assessment methods and techniques, evaluating quality of services and facilities supply, finding assessment models and tools for compensation and equal distribution of development transfer rights. The research group has also focused on assessing the level of community involvement (stakeholders and citizens) in urban planning (deliberative democratic processes). Project sustainability and built environment assessment The main goal of this research topic is to verify how public policies meet sustainable development requirements, achieving a good balance between expectations of economic improvement, environment protection and social equity. The Research Group is working on the integration of the GBTool assessment grid with multivariate analysis methods in order to synthesise the large amount of existing territorial and environmental data. In this way the GBTool could be used in describing, evaluating and maintaining environmental, social and economic quality of built environments with reference to local contexts. 119 The assessment of the level of sustainability of urban rehabilitation interventions is the main topic of the Observatory on the Administration and Urban Management, created in 2003, that periodically produces reports on the following issues: Timeliness and transparency of administrative actions (2003); Innovation of administrative actions and inclusive decision making processes (2005), Concepts and practices of mobility (2006). In 2006 a comparative survey was conducted at national level in order to identify goals and strategies for urban renewal case studies, with reference to sustainable development principles. Cultural heritage and environmental assets appraisal This research topic deals with the conservation of cultural heritage and environmental assets with reference to the Contingent Valuation Method. More specifically, the potential of the Total Economic Value approach to achieve these outcomes has been verified from both a methodological and effectiveness point of view: increased cooperation between community members; systematic and indepth knowledge of community needs; empowerment through tools for assessing project quality, transparency of public decision-making processes. Territorial marketing and branding The focus here is on defining principles and guidelines for urban and regional development dynamics in urban design and architecture, within an overall assessment of the technological quality, management and functional structure of building and territorial systems, and in describing sustainable development actions and objectives for cities. The marketing and branding of land and buildings is an important part of the research into practices intended to guarantee adequate service performance in meeting the different needs emerging from across a large spectrum of different stakeholders. Life cycle costing and cost management At this level we are faced with the following key issues: laws governing processes in building construction programming phases and the compilation of accounts; the coordination of information and related areas between project documents, covering project analysis techniques, control and scheduling; public interest or public utility projects; measuring the performance of construction projects for ensuring that planned improvements in quality, cost and time are achieved, processes for the planning, estimating, coordination, control and reporting of all cost-related aspects from project initiation to operation and maintenance; techniques to improve value and reduce costs such as value management, management control, WBS; post project review.

Departments

Dipartimento di Scienza e Tecnologie dell'Ambiente Costruito (BEST)

Professors

Full Professors
Sergio Mattia
Associate Professors
Gianfranco Brusa
Giovanni Utica
Assistant Professors
Alessandra Oppio