| dc.description.abstract | In recent years, many large areas lost their function because of budget cuts. Budget cuts relating to defence made sure that many military areas have become unnecessary. This has resulted in the emergence of abandoned military buildings and areas, the so called ‘military brownfields’. The Dutch government is the current owner of many military brownfields and wants to bring them back into productive use. Since more private initiatives and less dominance of the government have led to institutional reflection, the question arises what role the government should play in the redevelopment of military brownfields. Therefore, the central research question was: “What is the role of the Dutch government nowadays in redevelopment processes of military brownfields in different contexts?”
Since military brownfields have several specific features that significantly influence the potential for redevelopment, there is focused on military brownfields in different contexts. The marine area in Doorn has a non-urban, forested context, in contrast to Hembrug terrain in Zaandam that has an extremely urbanised context. A qualitative approach was chosen to analyse the military brownfields. By means of policy analysis and semi-structured interviews, the role of the Dutch government was analysed. Several key stakeholders in the redevelopment process of these military brownfields, such as project managers and process managers, were interviewed.
The analysis showed that the Dutch government continues to play a major role in redevelopment processes of military brownfields. The uncertain future appears to affect the role of the government in redevelopment processes. At the beginning of the development of Hembrug, there was little interest from the market to redevelop the site, due to the economic recession. The government had to take a leading role in initiating the redevelopment of the Hembrug terrain. In Doorn, the government also takes a leading role by initiating the redevelopment process, even before the marines have left. Attempts are made by the government in order to avoid that the military area will be vacant (for a long time), by already initiating the redevelopment process.
In addition, the analysis showed that the further in the redevelopment process, more and more detailed steering instruments are used. An explanation for this is that the if the redevelopment is in a further phase, the qualities of the military brownfield are increasingly recognized. More and detailed steering instruments ensure these qualities. The new physical environment plan has so far not led to less steering on behalf of the government. However, the physical environment plan does provide more flexibility for authorities, but also for market parties. This reflects the changes in the Dutch planning system and the corresponding changing roles of actors in planning processes that is discussed in the literature. There is a shift from the government governing in one-way traffic in policy to a government that is (actively) developing together with others. For the Hembrug terrain, the market parties and for Doorn the citizens have an important role in the redevelopment process. The government remains to have a dominant role, but non-governmental actors have gained an increasingly important role in both redevelopment processes. | |
