Brasilia, Brazil, 29 March - 3 April 1999
Housing Layout and Crime Vulnerability
Simon Chih-Feng Shu
The Bartlett School of Graduate Studies
(Torrington Place Site)
University College London
Gower Street
London WC1E 6BT
England
tel (44) (0)171 813 4364
fax (44) (0)171 813 4363
email ucftcsh@ucl.ac.uk
Much research from different disciplines has explored the crime-space
relationship often with controversial results. By employing the "Space
Syntax" analysis, this research proposes to examine the relation
between on the one hand spatial layouts of housing estates and urban areas
and on the other hand spatial distribution of property offences, based
on crime reports provided by the police, to see how far a definite and
consistent relationship can be established. A major concern would be the
issue of the accessibility of housing layout ( spatial configuration of
open spaces) and the relative vulnerability of property crimes, such as
burglary, criminal damage (vandalism) and car crimes. Case-studies cover
a wide range of social classes, such as middle-high, middle-working and
working class housing estates, and were carefully examined for a period
of two years. The findings from this research provide empirical evidence
for skepticism on the concept of "territoriality" and "defensible
space" put forward by Oscar Newman, and suggest that, other things
being equal, property crimes tend to cluster in those globally or locally
segregated areas, particularly in those unconstituted enclosed clusters
which Newman considered to be the key to increase local surveillance and
hence to exclude casual intrusion by non-residents.
_______________________________
_______________________________