Date of Award

2010

Degree Type

Dissertation

Department

Urban Studies

First Advisor

Simons, Robert

Subject Headings

Buildings -- Remodeling for other use, Church, Multinomial logit model, Adaptive reuse, Church, Multinomial logit model

Abstract

Adaptive reuse of historic buildings generates many tangible and intangible benefits. These benefits are not limited to the initiator (usually the developer) but are expanded to the community and the local government. This dissertation empirically investigates the role of tax credits in initiators' decisions to reuse religious buildings and their choice of reuse project outcomes, including the federal historic preservation tax credit, the low income housing tax credit, and the new market tax credit. Theses tax credits are the most commonly used tax credits in historic preservation projects. In addition, this dissertation also tests whether or not religious buildings were designated as the national historic places have affected initiators' decision to reuse religious buildings and in initiators' choices of reuse project outcomes. As far as I know, this is the first academic dissertation that tests these factors as reuse determinants. To test hypotheses of this dissertation, both the multiple-case study and statistical analyses were used. Five religious buildings that have been reused for different purposes are considered: the Meridian Street Methodist Episcopal Church in Indianapolis, IN the Notre Dame Academy in Cleveland, OH the Ashbury Delaware Methodist Church in Buffalo, NY the First Church of Christ Scientist in Cleveland, OH and the Orthodox Jewish Congregation - Cheva Bikur Cholim in Seattle, WA. In-depth interviews with developers were used to determine the important factors that drove their investments in the reuse projects. In addition, multinomial logit regressions were run using individual religious buildings reused for different purposes or religious purposes as the unit of analysis. Religious buildings sold to other religious entities were set as a reference category, meaning I compared religious buildings sold to other religious entities with each reuse outcome including condominiums, offices, retail space, low income housing, school, cultural place and undeveloped religious buildings

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