SAFEGROWTH®

SAFEGROWTH® BLOG

regular contributors
GREGORY SAVILLE · MATEJA MIHINJAC · LARRY LEACH 
SUBSCRIBE TO RECEIVE BLOG UPDATES DIRECTLY IN YOUR INBOX
  • HOME
  • WHO WE ARE
    • SAFEGROWTH NETWORK
    • SAFEGROWTH MOVEMENT
    • FRIENDS OF SAFEGROWTH
    • LIKEMINDED
  • WHAT WE DO
    • FOUR PHASES
    • SAFEGROWTH & LIVABILITY ACADEMY TRAINING >
      • Past SafeGrowth & Livability Academy projects
    • TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE & CRIME PREVENTION
    • CONSULTING & ADVISING
    • SUMMITS & SEARCH CONFERENCES
  • ABOUT SAFEGROWTH
    • History
    • Method & Philosophy
    • Theory
    • What makes great neighborhoods
  • RESOURCES
    • VIDEOS
    • Publications
    • SafeGrowth documents
    • TED-Ed tutorials >
      • SafeGrowth - Crime & the 21st Century City
      • Vision-Based Asset Mapping
    • Recommended readings
    • Press
    • SafeGrowth language
  • BOOKS
    • Building neighborhoods of safety & livability
    • Hope rises (awaiting publishing)
  • BLOG
  • PODCAST
  • TOOLKIT (PASSWORD ACCESS)
    • SAFEGROWTH RISK ASSESSMENT FOR NEIGHBORHOODS >
      • SAFEGROWTH RISK ASSESSMENT MATRIX
      • RISK ASSESSMENT CATEGORIES
      • 5 Steps & Report guidance >
        • Report structure
        • Sample reports
      • Readings for download
      • Glossary
    • Notes for SafeGrowth teams >
      • NEW YORK - HARLEM (2025) - COMPLETED
      • NEW YORK - BRONX (2024) - COMPLETED
      • NEW YORK - QUEENS (2024) - COMPLETED
      • BALTIMORE - BALTIMORE POLICE CLASS #2 (2024) - COMPLETED
      • BALTIMORE - BALTIMORE POLICE CLASS #1 (2024) - COMPLETED
      • MADISON (2024) - COMPLETED
      • SASKATOON (2024) - COMPLETED
      • VANCOUVER (2024) - COMPLETED
      • BALTIMORE (2024) - COMPLETED

30/6/2013

CPTED Conference follows historic floods

0 Comments

Read Now
 
​
This blog often ponders a future with eco-friendly, green technologies to create safer communities. Consider anti-graffiti moss, Saint Paul's transit-oriented development, last year's Rio + 20 environment conference and last week's blog on 3rd Generation CPTED.

Given catastrophe's from global warming these past few years, it's remarkable doubters still deny human-created climate change. I suppose some will always bypass science and spin alternate histories of a wishful and more stable past.

Even those riding the wayback machine cannot spin recent weather tragedies like the terrible Calgary floods last week. Like it or not, climate change is here to stay and every profession and community is affected. (Prior to 1990 only 3 disasters in Canadian history topped a half billion dollars in damages. In the past decade alone there have been 9).

It is ironic, yet sad, that next week's International CPTED Association conference will follow the 2013 Alberta Floods. That tragedy saw 100,000 residents evacuated, 4 deaths and $3 billion in damages. Thankfully the floods have subsided and the 2013 ICA conference is proceeding.

Calgary residents have done a remarkable job of recovery. The YouTube below tells their story.

The ICA conference carries the title: Creating Safer Communities - More Than Design. Nowhere is there a better time and place to consider the reality of that title and rethink our urban design and safety options in the years ahead.

Share

0 Comments

24/6/2013

3rd Generation CPTED and the eco-friendly city

0 Comments

Read Now
 
Picture
A new design for wiring public transit stops to the net - New Energy report

​At an ICA CPTED conference last year in Mexico City I introduced a paper from the SENSEable City Lab at the famed MIT sent to me just before the conference. It was fascinating. Published through the UN, it is titled; New Energy for Urban Security: Improving Urban Security Through Green Environmental Design.

As both a thought piece and a white paper, New Energy is a curious read, especially their ideas for a 3rd Generation CPTED.

To some CPTED traditionalists 3rd Generation CPTED will be heresy! When Gerry Cleveland and I introduced 2nd Generation CPTED in 1997, with its focus on neighborhood social dynamics, we too were met by gasps or yawns.

"No, no…" gasped those incredulous with what they saw as the imponderable, "That's not CPTED! CPTED is only about physical modifications for reducing crime opportunity."

Yawned others, "We've been doing that all along," (in spite of a lack of data recording where and no published training details whatsoever on how).


​REMEMBERING THE TITANS

Ever so gently (okay, maybe not so gently at times) we reminded them of the original writings of CPTED, laden with concepts like communities of interest and neighborliness and written by pioneers like Jacobs, Newman, Jeffery, Angel, Wood, and Gardiner. The naysayers parked their gasps and yawns and retreated to the comfort of their target hardened forts to snipe from the ramparts (I admit some bias in this affair).

Dare I say that 2nd Generation CPTED nowadays is a staple in training and practice? (Even if some trainers still mistakenly believe it's just a fancy name for activity support.) Thus is the nature of theory growth!

Now we approach another watershed.
​
The MIT folks propose integrating eco-sensibilities into CPTED with what they call 3rd Generation CPTED. The gist of their aim is to activate public dead spaces so they are more defensible, but doing so using green technology. "A green and digitally enhanced environmental design that addresses the concerns of cities."

Can't argue with that.

But is that really CPTED (gasp)? Aren't advanced designers already doing that (yawn)? Consider the eco-designs of Portland's City Repair program, founded by the keynote speaker at next week's ICA CPTED conference in Calgary.

Fearful of becoming my own nemesis, I read New Energy with gusto and discovered it was refreshing and exciting. Perhaps having a name for all this work isn't such a bad thing.


​ECO HIGH TECH SOLUTIONS

The coolest parts in the report are the eco-high-tech solutions: multi-functional and eco-friendly urban furniture that is crime safe; interactive urban art in public spaces to improve perceptions of safety (recall examples from Milan and Minneapolis I posted a few months ago).

Pretty cool stuff. My favorite? Wireless networks across the city made available on street furniture. Imagine video-based, touch screens on transit stops (see photo above) with real-time information on alternate routes during delays or Google Earth safe alternate routes home.

A bit Bladerunner-like…but still, pretty cool.
Picture
Interactive public art to activate public spaces - New Energy report

Share

0 Comments

18/6/2013

Plan B - TODs in Saint Paul

0 Comments

Read Now
 
Simulation of Saint Paul's new Transit Oriented Development light rail

Few CPTED or community development types think about Global Warming or climate change when they do their craft. That is a mistake. Plan B tells us why.

Plan B is an axiom in environmental studies meaning we cannot afford to wait before airborne carbon - a greenhouse gas -  destroys our ability to sustain cities. Global Warming triggers food shortages, diminishing freshwater, extreme weather, and water and air pollution with all the associated illnesses like emphysema or cancer.

Crime matters little if we cannot eat, drink, breathe or walk without fear of some threat to our mortality from the environment. In fact, desperation for those things might trigger more crime (as we saw in New Orleans during Katrina).

Plan B suggests that doing nothing is suicide. Plan B recommends making changes to our urban growth and transportation habits like reducing car dependency. This means Smart Growth planning (after which Safe Growth is fashioned).

​Introducing: Transit Oriented Development. TODs are one type of Smart Growth and they may be our future. They connect mixed use high density residential and commercial land uses and then cluster them within a half mile of a transit node, usually light rail. This encourages easy access to transit use at all times of day, high quality pedestrian connections, and amenities like local grocery stores. That reduces car dependency, increases walking, and builds social connections. At least that’s the theory.

The truth is that high urban densities, TODs and Smart Growth neither promotes nor prevents crime. The devil is in the details. Where do people walk and recreate? Do they have local opportunities to know each other as friendly neighbors? How does the design treat lighting and sightlines. And what about security and safety?
Picture
Unsafe or unsightly urban design will kill TODs - Photo Seth Budlick

​We’re running a SafeGrowth program in Saint Paul, Minnesota (shown in the simulation video above). Participants are working on SafeGrowth plans on that city’s first TOD development, a light rail in a city that does not have one. Safety and security on and near that line will determine the economic success of the system. Success in safety will increase transit ridership, decrease car ridership, and provide one more tiny step to save the planet and our children. A win-win.


Not much pressure! Who said CPTED and SafeGrowth was simple?

Share

0 Comments

9/6/2013

Placemaking and civic safety

0 Comments

Read Now
 
Picture
Winnipeg building mural and frontage - missed opportunity

​I get great ideas from friends. Here are two.

Walking around Winnipeg Manitoba this past weekend a friend pointed out the irony of this building mural. The beauty of the former building front on the mural; the sad reality of failed expectations on the actual building front.

The idea of placemaking has made regular appearances on this blog. Placemaking is about creating positive social life in public places. How does one do that?

The fellow who pointed out the irony of the Winnipeg mural was Gerry Cleveland, my colleague and co-creator of 2nd Generation CPTED. Second Generation CPTED promotes placemaking by activating residents, getting them involved, helping them learn how to take action and teaching basic organizing skills. That's the future.

Share

0 Comments
Details
    SUBSCRIBE TO RECEIVE BLOG UPDATES DIRECTLY IN YOUR INBOX

    REGULAR CONTRIBUTORS

    GREGORY SAVILLE
    TARAH HODGKINSON
    MATEJA MIHINJAC

    CATEGORIES

    All
    15-minute City
    4S
    AI
    Alcohol
    Alternative Development
    Art
    Artificial Intelligence
    Biophilia
    Black Lives Matter
    Bladerunner
    Bus Stops
    CCTV
    Change Agent
    Civility
    Collaboration
    Community Building
    Community Empowerment
    Community Engagement
    Community Safety
    Connectivity
    COVID 19
    COVID-19
    CPTED
    C. Ray Jeffery
    Creativity
    Crime Analysis
    Crime Displacement
    Crime Disruptors
    Crime Opportunity
    Crime Prevention
    Crime Rates
    Crime Severity Index
    Criminology
    Culture
    Cure Violence
    Defensible Space
    Design Out Crime
    Diversity
    Downtown
    Drottninghog
    Emotional Intelligence
    Entertainment Districts
    Environmental Criminology
    Ethics
    Europe
    Evidence-based
    Eyes On The Street
    Fake News
    Fear Of Crime
    Feminism
    Food Access
    Future Cities
    Global Warming
    Governance
    Graffiti
    Green Spaces
    H22
    H22 Smart City Expo
    HACE
    Harmscapes
    Health
    Helsingborg
    Homelessness
    Housing
    Human Scale Design
    ICA
    Immigration
    Inclusiveness
    Indigenous
    International CPTED Association
    Laneway
    Latin America
    Law
    Law Enforcement
    Lighting
    LISC
    Livability
    Livability Academy
    Local Capacity
    Local Democracy
    Local Trust
    Location Quotient
    Loneliness
    Lovability
    Mental Health
    Motivation
    Neighborhood
    Neighborhood Asset
    Neighborhood Governance
    Neighborhood Hubs
    Neighborhood Livability Hierarchy
    Neighborhood Transformation
    NIMBY
    Operation Ceasefire
    Partnerships
    PBL
    Philadelphia
    Placemaking
    Policing
    Politics
    Populism
    Predictive Policing
    Problem Based Learning
    Problem-based Learning
    Professionalization
    Protests
    Public Health
    Quality Of Life
    Restorative City
    Restorative Justice
    Rural Crime
    SafeGrowth
    Safety Audits
    San Romanoway
    Science
    Second Generation CPTED
    Security
    Self-governance
    Sitability
    Situational Crime Prevention
    Smart City
    Smart Growth
    Social Cohesion
    Social Distancing
    Social Ecology
    Social Isolation
    Social Justice
    Social Unrest
    Space Activation
    Street Walkability
    Suburbs
    Successful Places
    Surveillance
    Sustainability
    Sweden
    Target Hardening
    Technology
    Theory
    Third Generation CPTED
    Third Places
    TOD
    Transportation
    Urban Decline
    Urbanism
    Urban Planning
    Violence
    Youth


    ARCHIVES

    July 2024
    October 2023
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012
    June 2012
    May 2012
    April 2012
    March 2012
    February 2012
    January 2012
    December 2011
    November 2011
    October 2011
    September 2011
    August 2011
    July 2011
    June 2011
    May 2011
    April 2011
    March 2011
    February 2011
    January 2011
    December 2010
    November 2010
    October 2010
    September 2010
    August 2010
    July 2010
    June 2010
    May 2010
    April 2010
    March 2010
    February 2010
    January 2010
    December 2009
    November 2009
    October 2009
    September 2009
    August 2009
    July 2009
    June 2009
    May 2009
    April 2009
    March 2009
    February 2009


CONTACT

[email protected]


​AlterNation LLC is the parent company managing the SafeGrowth Alliance. 
Check out our website: www.alternation.ca

Picture

SafeGrowth® 2007-2025
All rights reserved.

© A registered product of AlterNation LLC

SafeGrowth® is a philosophy and theory of neighborhood safety planning for 21st Century.

​SafeGrowth® is available all over the world for creating new relationships between city government and residents. Any city can adopt this philosophy thereby creating empowered neighborhoods resistant to crime with residents engaged in planning their own future.


  • HOME
  • WHO WE ARE
    • SAFEGROWTH NETWORK
    • SAFEGROWTH MOVEMENT
    • FRIENDS OF SAFEGROWTH
    • LIKEMINDED
  • WHAT WE DO
    • FOUR PHASES
    • SAFEGROWTH & LIVABILITY ACADEMY TRAINING >
      • Past SafeGrowth & Livability Academy projects
    • TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE & CRIME PREVENTION
    • CONSULTING & ADVISING
    • SUMMITS & SEARCH CONFERENCES
  • ABOUT SAFEGROWTH
    • History
    • Method & Philosophy
    • Theory
    • What makes great neighborhoods
  • RESOURCES
    • VIDEOS
    • Publications
    • SafeGrowth documents
    • TED-Ed tutorials >
      • SafeGrowth - Crime & the 21st Century City
      • Vision-Based Asset Mapping
    • Recommended readings
    • Press
    • SafeGrowth language
  • BOOKS
    • Building neighborhoods of safety & livability
    • Hope rises (awaiting publishing)
  • BLOG
  • PODCAST
  • TOOLKIT (PASSWORD ACCESS)
    • SAFEGROWTH RISK ASSESSMENT FOR NEIGHBORHOODS >
      • SAFEGROWTH RISK ASSESSMENT MATRIX
      • RISK ASSESSMENT CATEGORIES
      • 5 Steps & Report guidance >
        • Report structure
        • Sample reports
      • Readings for download
      • Glossary
    • Notes for SafeGrowth teams >
      • NEW YORK - HARLEM (2025) - COMPLETED
      • NEW YORK - BRONX (2024) - COMPLETED
      • NEW YORK - QUEENS (2024) - COMPLETED
      • BALTIMORE - BALTIMORE POLICE CLASS #2 (2024) - COMPLETED
      • BALTIMORE - BALTIMORE POLICE CLASS #1 (2024) - COMPLETED
      • MADISON (2024) - COMPLETED
      • SASKATOON (2024) - COMPLETED
      • VANCOUVER (2024) - COMPLETED
      • BALTIMORE (2024) - COMPLETED