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The state of the application of brownfield sites for housing and infrastructure development: a systematic review
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2026-06-08
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Abstract
The necessity of brownfield remediation has drawn more attention to scholarly literature in recent years. This review aims to understand the application of brownfield regeneration to sustainable housing and infrastructure development. With an emphasis on deciding the obstacles to regeneration, success factors, and their effects on outcomes, including the environmental, social, and economic aspects of housing and infrastructure development, this paper employs a systematic literature review approach to analyse current perspectives on brownfield regeneration for housing and infrastructure. This paper employs the PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) approach and frequency based meta-synthesis to systematically quantify how often specific teams, variables, barriers, or concepts appear in body of literature. This investigation thoroughly examined 88 publications from the Scopus database. The research also classified and highlighted institutional and legal, financial and economic, socio-political, and environmental challenges to brownfield regeneration. The main success criteria for brownfield regeneration are mature policy alignment, approval processes, grants, and access to financial incentives. The developing gap found in this study should be the focus of future research. To address financial obstacles, a strong business case model for brownfield sites that provide investors or stakeholders with a financial forecast is needed. Finally, it is essential to develop a sustainable framework for brownfield site regeneration that encompasses all sustainable dimensions related to housing and infrastructure development. Finally, the review contributes to theory and practice by giving a comprehensive overview of brownfield barriers, success factors, and their impact on academics and industry.
Citation
Letsuwa, J., Daniel, E. I., Pathirage, C., Eshiet, K. I.-I. I., & Mahmood, S. (2026). The State of the Application of Brownfield Sites for Housing and Infrastructure Development: A Systematic Review. Buildings, 16 (12), article no. 2294. https://doi.org/10.3390/buildings16122294
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Journal article
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en
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© 2026 The Authors. Published by MDPI AG. This is an open access article available under a Creative Commons licence.
The published version can be accessed at the following link on the publisher’s website: https://doi.org/10.3390/buildings16122294
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2075-5309
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2075-5309
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This research was funded by the Faculty of Science and Engineering (Invest to Grow Studentship) for which the authors are grateful. The view presented in this study is that of the authors.