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Designing Out Crime

NCJ Number
78253
Editor(s)
R V G Clarke, P Mayhew
Date Published
1980
Length
186 pages
Annotation
This collection of research studies focuses on crime prevention measures that are directed at highly specific forms of crime and that involve the management, design, or manipulation of the immediate environment in which these crimes occur.
Abstract
Conducted between 1976-80, the studies examine the impact of introducing steering column locks for cars manufactured after 1970 on car theft in Greater London; explore the effects of surveillance by bus crews on bus vandalism; and test Oscar Newman's defensible space hypothesis in relation to two London housing projects. In addition, the effects of 'natural surveillance' on telephone kiosk vandalism in a London borough are assessed, and the experimental introduction of closed-circuit television stations in the London Underground to reduce theft and robbery is evaluated. Other studies examine the effects of a police publicity campaign in Plymouth, England, to persuade owners to lock their cars, a Home Office auto crime publicity campaign conducted in the north of England in 1979, and a Home Office antivandalism publicity campaign conducted in Northwest England in 1978. Progress is reported on a project conducted by the Crime Policy Planning Unit of the Home Office which focuses on the vandalism in Manchester schools, agreed solutions, and some early implementation problems. Footnotes, graphs, and tabular data are given. A subject and author index, list of publications, and about 140 references are appended. For individual papers see NCJ 78254-58. (Author abstract modified)