Special Issue "Public Projects, Public–Private Partnerships and Economic Sustainability Evaluation"

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Economic and Business Aspects of Sustainability".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 September 2021.

Special Issue Editors

Prof. Dr. Cristina Coscia
E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Architecture and Design, Politecnico di Torino, Turin, Italy
Interests: heritage economic enhancement; strategic evaluation for decision making; social impact assessment; public project evaluation
Prof. Dr. Elena Fregonara
E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Architecture and Design, Politecnico di Torino, Turin, Italy
Interests: evaluation of project economic sustainability; life cycle costing; real estate market analysis
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The current context, strongly characterized by the COVID-19 pandemic and by financial, economic and environmental emergencies, has further highlighted long-standing fragility: in particular, attention is focused on the need to relaunch the public role of institutions as a driving force and guarantee and guide in urban and territorial transformation processes.

This obviously clashes with the critical issues of depletion of resources and their scarcity, as well as emergencies—not only the current COVID-19 pandemic emergency, but climatic and social ones.

The scientific community has highlighted the need for these challenges to be considered by decision makers in the field of real estate appraisal and project economic evaluation. More specifically, the question of interest is what the premises and the perspectives are for new approaches and evaluation methods. A real rethinking of approaches is necessary in light of the current situation, especially considering the urgent need for new tools that support investment planning and capital budgeting, specifically planning, evaluating, and controlling investments, which capture the complexity of contemporary interventions along their life cycle, and that support the subjects involved in decision-making processes. The consolidated approaches for analyzing investments and for testing their feasibility can no more be related to the linear economic perspective: they must be revised to follow a circular perspective.

Assuming these premises, the following issues must be incorporated into the judgments of economic–financial convenience:

1) The life cycle of projects in light of recent international/European directives and standards, assuming the Circular Economy principles;

2) Alternative or supplementary ways to find resources (e.g., real estate crowdfunding also used in new generation real estate funds);

3) The economic and social balance sheets of different stakeholders;

4) Public–private partnership models in which the relationships of responsibility and risk are evident.

The key questions that can be addressed are:

1) Are traditional tools of investment analysis and evaluation of public plans and projects still suitable? If so, how is the scientific community critically rethinking them?

2) How is the role of the public entity being redefined in these perspective?

3) Which sustainability evaluation approaches are being adopted to evaluate and monitor public interventions throughout their life cycle, also in light of the European energy–environmental policies?

4) Are new forms of risk and responsibility emerging in regeneration interventions?

5) Which feasibility evaluation approaches are being developed to enhance the existent Heritage?

6) Are new models of public–private partnership being tested?

All contributions providing research findings, experiences, and applications on these topics are welcome.

Prof. Dr. Cristina Coscia
Prof. Dr. Elena Fregonara
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All papers will be peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • evaluation of project economic sustainability
  • public projects
  • PPP
  • life cycle thinking
  • circular economy
  • risk and responsibility
  • economic–financial feasibility
  • real estate market analysis
  • public project evaluation
  • sustainable development
  • urban planning tools
  • decision-making support tools

Published Papers (1 paper)

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Research

Article
Networking Digital Platforms and Healthcare Project Finance Bankability
Sustainability 2021, 13(9), 5061; https://doi.org/10.3390/su13095061 - 30 Apr 2021
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 499
Abstract
Framework: Healthcare project finance (PF) involves long-term structural investments in hospitals, typically within a public–private partnership (PPP). Banks represent the third major stakeholder, supporting the private player. Within this well-known framework, digital platforms represent a new virtual stakeholder, operating as a bridging node [...] Read more.
Framework: Healthcare project finance (PF) involves long-term structural investments in hospitals, typically within a public–private partnership (PPP). Banks represent the third major stakeholder, supporting the private player. Within this well-known framework, digital platforms represent a new virtual stakeholder, operating as a bridging node that incorporates information, and eases transactions. The relationships among the stakeholders are re-engineered around the platform and may be expressed with network theory patterns, even considering its multilayer extensions. Justification: As these investments are highly leveraged, especially during the construction phase, bankability represents a major sustainability concern. Objective: The research question is focused on the savings deriving from the introduction of networked digital platforms, and on their impact on bankability, shaping a new PPP model. Methodology: The study is conducted through (a) an economic–financial sensitivity analysis where digital savings impact on key PF parameters, including bankability; (b) a mathematical interpretation, based on network theory, where the stakeholders of two ecosystems—respectively, without and with a digital platform—are compared. Results: The creation of a value-adding “pie” anticipates its partitioning among the value co-creating stakeholders. This study represents an advance in the field, showing how technological innovation may improve the overall bankability and the value creation of leveraged infrastructural investments, even beyond the healthcare industry. Full article
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