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This paper aims to analyse the impact of public investments in facilities on the potential housing market for older persons by expanding the generally used approach of modelling working-age population to the approach of modelling the cohort of older population.

The paper introduces an asymmetric approach and normalization to the special case of spatial interaction models, i.e. the Lowry-like model, to analyse significant factors that influence migration flows structured by age cohorts. The model uses publicly available and free databases at the mezzo level in a state. The analysis was performed for inter-municipal interactions of migrants structured by age cohorts.

The results show the different influences of Lowry’s main factors that influence the migration flows in industrial societies. The higher the average age of migrants, the lower the influences in the Lowry model. But, this is also valid for the impact of investments in public facilities and their management at the mezzo level on older migrants. Furthermore, institutional care facilities in a local community were proven to be an important factor to attract older persons.

The results show that there are other important factors that influence the migration flows of older persons. So, for better results, more structured data on investments and management of the facilities and other more subjective factors should be included in the model.

The paper gives suggestions for further development of the models to analyse the potential housing market for older persons.

In addition to the suggested approach to study the impact of investments in facilities on the older population, this paper also identifies a need for more in-depth studies into this topic in the near future.

Refugee camps are not easily welcomed by local communities. The purpose of this paper is to outline a structured approach to support the decision-making process for siting refugee camps in mainland Greece using multiple criteria, including local opposition. A suitability analysis generates a list of potential sites and a multiple criteria evaluation is applied. The motivation is the development of a methodology that can support choices and policies regarding the refugee camps siting problem, incorporating the need to address local opposition.

The proposed methodology combines geographic information systems (GIS) with multiple criteria decision-making (MCDM) techniques. These are used to develop a location classification and ranking model based on related criteria and subcriteria, attributes and weights. The region of Peloponnese in Greece is selected as a case study to validate the approach.

The lack of predefined candidate sites for refugee camps necessitates, initially, tackling a site search problem to generate a pool of potential sites through a suitability analysis. Subsequently, using the GIS the pool yields a subset of potential sites, satisfying all the criteria to setup a refugee camp. Through the current analysis the suitability of the single existing refugee camp site in Peloponnese can be evaluated. Finally, a “with and without” analysis, excluding the social criterion, depicts the changes in the candidate sites pool and their scores.

There is a lack of relevant literature taking into account the local opposition or sociopolitical implications as decision criteria. The selection of the appropriate criteria is a complex process that involves the cooperation of many experts. The main criteria, subcriteria and their attributes were determined according to existing literature and authors' informed judgment.

The proposed methodology can help decision-makers to setup a decision-making system and process for identifying refugee camps' sites using multiple criteria, including local opposition.