Multiple Criteria Decision Analysis to Assess Urban and Territorial Transformations: Insights from Practical Applications

This chapter aims at providing concrete reflections about the use of the Multiple Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDAs) in urban and territorial decision processes. The reflections provided by this chapter come from a critical analysis of different case studies faced by the Turin research group (Politecnico di Torino, InterUniversity Department DIST) composed by the authors, in some case in collaboration with other academics. Over the last decade in fact, the authors applied a number of MCDA to case studies of different nature in order to provide answers to decision-making problems in urban and territorial planning realms, towards a sustainable development. Specifically, the case studies analysed in this chapter refer to seven contexts: (i) infrastructural transport planning strategies; (ii) location of undesirable facilities; (iii) strategic urban planning; (iv) urban energy retrofitting; (v) real estate investments; (vi) cultural adaptive reuse of abandoned buildings; and (vii) environmental systems. The aforementioned case studies cover different geographical scales of intervention (local, national and transnational) offering here the opportunity to reflect around the use of MCDA as Analytic Network Process (ANP), ANP and Spatial Decision Support Systems (SDSS), Dominance Based Rough-Sets Approach (DRSA), Measuring Attractiveness by a Categorical Based Evaluation Technique (MACBETH), Preference Ranking Organization METHod for Enrichment of Evaluations (PROMETHEE), CATegorization by Similarity-Dissimilarity (CAT-SD) and Elimination Et Choix Traduisant La Realité (ELECTRE). The applications presented show that the MCDA can be a useful support to the decision-makers in order to structure the decision process in exam, characterized by a plurality of stakeholders with different interests, powers and goals. In particular, starting from the case studies, the authors highlight the applicability and the decision-making relevance of the different MCDA