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Brownfields Training, Research,
and Technical Assistance
Grant Fact Sheet
Metropolitan Institute at
Virginia Tech
EPA Brownfields Program
EPA's Brownfields Program empowers states.
communities, and other stakeholders to work together to
prevent, assess, safely clean up, and sustainably reuse
brownfields. A brownfield site is real property, the
expansion, redevelopment, or reuse of which may be
complicated by the presence or potential presence of a
hazardous substance, pollutant, or contaminant.
EPA's Brownfields Training, Research, and Technical
Assistance grants provide funding to eligible
organizations to provide training, research, and technical
assistance to facilitate brownfields revitalization. These
grants will also provide research and technical assistance
to communities throughout the United States.
Organization Description
As one of Virginia Tech's premier research initiatives, the
Metropolitan Institute conducts basic and applied
research on the dynamics of metropolitan complexities,
such as demographics, environment, technology, design,
transportation, and governance. The Metropolitan
Institute's research goals revolve around the analysis of
the complex dynamics of urbanization and the concrete
applicable information needed to improve the design,
planning, and development of metropolitan spaces. The
Metropolitan Institute provides an interdisciplinary
platform for academic researchers from public policy,
geography and planning, economics, computational
sciences, architecture, and engineering to advance the
cause of designing, planning, and administering resilient
and sustainable urban spaces.
Project Description
The Metropolitan Institute proposes to develop and run a
pilot test of a "Community Benefits Calculator" that will
merge national, state, and local data into a model that can
Grantee:
Metropolitan Institute at Virginia Tech
Topic Area:
Research on the Benefits of Brownfields Redevelopment
Project Period:
2014-2019
Total Grant Award:
$1,000,000
Contacts
For further information about the Metropolitan Institute at
Virginia Tech and its brownfields technical assistance
activities, visit http://www.mi.vt.edu/. For more
information about this project, call 703-706-8102.
For further information, including specific grant contacts,
additional grant information, brownfields news and
events, and publications and links, visit the EPA
Brownfields web site at: http://www.epa.gov/brownfields
or call 202-566- 2777.
* The information presented in this fact sheet comes from
the proposal for technical assistance; EPA cannot attest to
the accuracy of this information. The implementation plan
for the technical assistance has not yet been finalized.
Therefore, activities described in this fact sheet are
subject to change.
track the social, environmental, and economic benefits to
a community from the reuse of brownfields. This
calculator will be in the form of a mobile device
application, which will allow for the efficient and
consistent collection of community condition data by
stakeholders, such as local officials and community
members, into a national database. Once the calculator is
developed, the Institute will select a pilot partner
community with strong "open data" policies in which to
test it to determine how easily it can be employed for data
collection and the consistency and reliability of the
generated impact measures. When the calculator is ready
for wider use, the Institute will: 1) develop an easy-to-
access users manual; 2) host a series of webinars based on
the users manual that will serve as "Train-the-Trainer"
sessions; 3) provide in-person or virtual workshops for
state brownfields staff to obtain feedback; and 4) develop
a strategic plan for stimulating adoption and wider
utilization of the tool.
Solid Waste and
Emergency Response
(5105T)
EPA 560-F-14-202
June 2014
www.epa.gov/brownfields
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