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Metropolitan Institute's List: Vacant Property Data + Information Systems

  • Aug 04, 11

    Brophy, Paul and Vey, Jennifer, 2002. "Seizing City Assets: Ten Steps to Urban Land Reform," The Brookings Institution, October 2002. http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/Files/rc/reports/2002/10metropolitanpolicy_brophy/brophyveyvacantsteps.pdf


    Introduction:
    "One of a city's greatest assets is its available land for development. Unfortunately, many cities have land and properties that are vacant, abandoned, or under-used, with few policies and regulations in place to convert these assets into valuable, revenue-generating sites. This brief outlines ten action steps that state and local governments can follow to facilitate the development of urban land and buildings. Compiling an inventory of vacant parcels, planning for the assembly and reuse of land, and working to eliminate the many legal and administrative barriers to acquisition and development are just some of the actions the authors recommend for creating a more transparent, efficient, and effective system for private-market land development. The brief will discuss these and other proposed steps, and will highlight examples of successful practices implemented in states and localities throughout the U.S."

  • Aug 04, 11

    Accordino, John and Johnson, Gary (2000). Addressing the Vacant and Abandoned Property Problem. Journal of Urban Affairs, 22(3), 301-315.

    Abstract: "Vacant and abandoned property is increasingly recognized as a significant barrier to the revitalization of central cities. This study sheds some light on the nature of the property abandonment problem and on current city efforts to address it. It is based upon the findings of a survey of the 200 most populous central cities in the United States, conducted during the summer and fall of 1997, and on follow-up interviews with a portion of the survey population, conducted during the summer of 1998. The findings of the survey and interviews indicate that vacant and abandoned property is perceived as a significant problem by elected and appointed officials in the nation's largest central cities. This type of property affects many aspects of community life, including housing and neighborhood vitality, crime prevention efforts, and commercial district vitality. Single- and multi-family housing, retail properties and vacant land are the most problematic types of vacant and abandoned property for most cities. Cities use a variety of techniques to address this problem, including aggressive code enforcement, tax foreclosure, eminent domain, and cosmetic improvements. One-third of the cities surveyed use a variety of other innovative tools to combat the vacant and abandoned property problem. Nevertheless, current efforts to combat the problem suffer from a number of shortcomings that are described in the article."

  • Apr 22, 11

    Hillier, Amy E., Dennis P. Culhane, Tony E. Smith, and C. Dana Tomlin. "Predicting Housing Abandonment with the Philadelphia Neighborhood Information System." Journal of Urban Affairs 25, no. 1 (2003): 91-105.

    "Several large US cities, including Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, and Philadelphia, have developed information systems to distribute property-level housing data to community organizations and municipal agencies. These early warning systems are also intended to predict which properties are at greatest risk of abandonment, but they have rarely used statistical modeling to support such forecasts. This study used logistic regression to analyze data from the Philadelphia Neighborhood Information System in order to determine which properties were most likely to become imminently dangerous. Several different characteristics of the property, including whether it was vacant, had outstanding housing code violations, and tax arrearages as well as characteristics of nearby properties were identified as significant predictors. Challenges common to the development of early warning systems - including integrating administrative data, defining abandonment, and modeling temporal and spatial data - are discussed along with policy implications for cities like Philadelphia that have thousands of vacant and abandoned properties."

  • Winthrop, Bob, and Rebecca Herr. "Determining the Cost of Vacancies in Baltimore." Government Finance Review 25, no. 3 (2009): 39-42.

     

    This article focuses on the cost of police services that are associated with vacant properties, specifically in relation to Baltimore, MD. 

     

  • May 10, 11

    Thomas, Michael R. "A GIS-based decision support system for brownfield redevelopment." Landscape and Urban Planning 58, 1 (2002): 7-23.

    "To evaluate land use options with respect to brownfields inventory, characterization, and potential for redevelopment, both government and private decision makers need access to information regarding land capability; development incentives; public goals, interests, and preferences; and environmental concerns such as site contamination and environmental quality. This article discusses a decision support system that provides access to state, regional, and local geospatial databases, several informational and visualization tools, and assumptions useful in providing a better understanding of issues, options, and alternatives in redeveloping brownfields. The resultant decision support system is augmented by a unique geographic information systems-based land use modeling application as an integrated expert system." (from abstract)

  • Aug 04, 11

    Cleveland Community Research Partners and ReBuild Ohio. (2008). "$60 Million and Counting: The Cost of Vacant and Abandoned Properties to Eight Ohio Cities."

    Executive Summary: "This research documents the magnitude and cost of the vacant and abandoned properties problem in eight Ohio cities Cleveland, Columbus, Dayton, Ironton, Lima, Springfield, Toledo, Zanesville. The research found:

    * 25,000 vacant and abandoned properties
    * Widespread vacancies in both large and small cities
    * $15 million in annual city service costs
    * $49 million in cumulative lost property tax revenues to local governments and school districts
    * Weakened neighborhood housing markets with evidence of property flipping
    * Limited capacity of cities, on their own, to track and address vacant and abandoned properties

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