NCJ Number
104239
Date Published
1985
Length
36 pages
Annotation
Focusing on a crime prevention through environmental design (CPTED) model, this handbook provides police with practical guidelines for reducing the opportunity for crime in urban and rural areas of Canada.
Abstract
Emphasis is placed on the importance of police-community relations in crime prevention and the need for an analysis of the types of crime occurring in a targeted area, the time and frequency of occurrence, the characteristics of perpetrators and the victims, and environmental factors that contribute to criminal opportunity. The CPTED approach assumes that environmental design features can help modify behaviors by creating defensible space and real and symbolic barriers that increase residents' perceptions of security and control. The overall objective of CPTED is to reduce crime and fear of crime using an all-inclusive environmental approach involving law enforcement, physical, social, and economic elements. Consequently, successful efforts require interagency collaboration in problem definition, program planning and development, evaluation, and implementation. Basic design strategies of the CPTED model include natural surveillance, activity program support, defensible space, territoriality, target hardening, formal surveillance, and access control. On the basis of a security analysis, these basic strategies can be applied to apartment complexes and single-home residential areas. Four case studies illustrate the implementation of a CPTED model. Appended sample questionnaire.