A dam or a polder? Stakeholders' dispute over the "right" flood-protection measure in the Czech Republic

This study focuses on the Skalička Waterwork (SWW), a largely debated and media-covered water-related/flood-protection project in the Czech Republic. Relying primarily on stakeholder interviews, we traced back and reconstructed the project's development, including its key tipping points reflecting the changing societal preferences for particular measures, yet also the involvement of individual actors/stakeholders, and their differing views. The case eventually crystallized into the "dam versus polder" dispute; concerned by the repercussions for the local landscape, a joint initiative of NGOs, local activists, and politicians not only opposed the dam variant proposed by the state river basin administration but also succeeded in pushing through the alternative scheme of side dry polder. While in many ways specific (e.g. not entailing local resistance), the case exemplifies recent shifts (and respective struggles) within flood risk management, including the increasing importance attributed to complex, catchment-wide perspectives, joint local and scientific knowledge, participatory decision-making processes, or implementation of nature-based and hybrid solutions.

Direct or indirect energy savings in food and beverage services? Visitors' preferences in hotel restaurants

Food processing in hotels is one of most energy-intensive activities in the tourism industry. There is an urgent need to reduce energy consumption in hotels to limit their environmental impact. This research aims to assess tourists' preferences for the provision of food that require low energy preparation and to compare them with tourists' preferences for other indirect energy saving options. A quantitative survey with 944 tourists visiting six tourist sites across the Czech Republic was used for primary data collection. Data were analyzed using linear regression models. Our findings signal that direct energy savings tend to be perceived differentially and surprisingly as the least preferred option among tourists. Those who support direct energy savings in food processing are rather older respondents and also respondents who declare stronger pro-environmental everyday behaviour and subjective norms. We claim that as tourists show highly diverse preferences for various ways of energy savings, we need to ensure that multiple energy saving options are offered so that tourists contribute to reducing the ecological footprint of hotels. At the same time, it has to be highlighted that only few surveyed tourists voluntarily accepted reduction of comfort in the food and beverage provision. There is room for many technological and social innovations and raising environmental awareness among tourists to overcome this contradiction.

Regeneration of Post-Agricultural Brownfield for Social Care Needs in Rural Community: Is There Any Transferable Experience?

In the 21st century, rural communities face many challenges, including implications of dynamic population aging, a lack of social care services, and the occurrence of abandoned post-agricultural brownfields. This paper is methodologically based on the findings derived from a set of qualitative in-depth interviews with the key rural stakeholders, explores the decisive factors and limits, accelerators, and barriers governing successful regeneration of the post-agricultural brownfield in the post-socialist environment. We are using the case of the regeneration project of a large-scale former communist agricultural cooperative, located in Vranovice, the Czech Republic, to illuminate how complex and challenging the redevelopment of a post-agricultural brownfield into a social care facility for elderly people is. A wide agreement among the experts in the field of community development exists that this regeneration project can serve as a model example for other rural municipalities that are sharing similar local development issues. Our findings illustrate how important and challenging at the same time are the matters of good governance, the active and long-term participation of stakeholders in the regeneration project, and the real-life introduction of the public–private partnership concept, particularly in immensely transforming the post-socialist countryside.

Points of attention in designing tools for regional brownfield prioritization

The regeneration of brownfields has been increasingly recognized as a key instrument in sustainable land management, since free developable land (or so called "greenfields") has become a scare and more expensive resource, especially in densely populated areas. However, the complexity of these sites requires considerable efforts to successfully complete their revitalization projects, thus requiring the development and application of appropriate tools to support decision makers in the selection of promising sites where efficiently allocate the limited financial resources. The design of effective prioritization tools is a complex process, which requires the analysis and consideration of critical points of attention (PoAs) which has been identified considering the state of the art in literature, and lessons learned from previous developments of regional brownfield (BF) prioritization processes, frameworks and tools. Accordingly, we identified 5 PoAs, namely 1) Assessing end user needs and orientation discussions, 2) Availability and quality of the data needed for the BF prioritization tool, 3) Communication and stakeholder engagement 4) Drivers of regeneration success, and 5) Financing and application costs. To deepen and collate the most recent knowledge on the topics from scientists and practitioners, we organized a focus group discussion within a special session at the AquaConSoil (ACS) conference 2017, where participants were asked to add their experience and thoughts to the discussion in order to identify the most significant and urgent points of attention in BF prioritization tool design. The result of this assessment is a comprehensive table (Table 2), which can support problem owners, investors, service providers, regulators, public and private land managers, decision makers etc. in the identification of the main aspects (sub-topics) to be considered and their relative influences and in the comprehension of the general patterns and challenges to be faced when dealing with the development of BF prioritization tools.

Targeted selection of brownfields from portfolios for sustainable regeneration: User experiences from five cases testing the Timbre Brownfield Prioritization Tool

Prioritizing brownfields for redevelopment in real estate portfolios can contribute to more sustainable regeneration and land management. Owners of large real estate and brownfield portfolios are challenged to allocate their limited resources to the development of the most critical or promising sites, in terms of time and cost efficiency. Authorities worried about the negative impacts of brownfields - in particular in the case of potential contamination - on the environment and society also need to prioritize their resources to those brownfields that most urgently deserve attention and intervention. Yet, numerous factors have to be considered for prioritizing actions, in particular when adhering to sustainability principles. Several multiple-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) approaches and tools have been suggested in order to support these actors in managing their brownfield portfolios. Based on lessons learned from the literature on success factors, sustainability assessment and MCDA approaches, researchers from a recent EU project have developed the web-based Timbre Brownfield Prioritization Tool (TBPT). It facilitates assessment and prioritization of a portfolio of sites on the basis of the probability of successful and sustainable regeneration or according to individually specified objectives. This paper introduces the challenges of brownfield portfolio management in general and reports about the application of the TBPT in five cases: practical test-uses by two large institutional land owners from Germany, a local and a regional administrative body from the Czech Republic, and an expert from a national environmental authority from Romania. Based on literature requirements for sustainability assessment tools and on the end-users' feedbacks from the practical tests, we discuss the TBPT's strengths and weaknesses in order to inform and give recommendations for future development of prioritization tools.