A Model to Construct Crime Risk Scenarios Supporting Urban Planning Choices

Abstract

AbstractThe topic of urban security has a key role in creating sustainable cities and communities. Improving the personal security conditions in relation to the occurrence of predatory crimes or incivility, as well as the perception related to such events, is an important necessity in response to the Sustainable Development Goals of the 2030 Agenda and more specifically SDG 11 ‒ Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable. The proposed research addresses the issue through a quantitative model of crime risk assessment. Specifically, the model is substantiated through a spatially explicit composite crime risk index, IRc, which allows to analyse the criticalities of the territory, highlighting their intensity and surface extension through a crime risk map. Such an index varies significantly over time, as well as varying in space, since the variables involved are extremely dynamic. In order to control this aspect, the paper proposes the construction of a parametric model in a GIS environment with a double purpose. The first one is to automate the implementation of the crime risk map construction procedure and make it replicable in any context and at any scale. The second is to control the whole procedure in order to explore the parameters in relation to which risk levels vary most significantly. The usefulness of such a model lies in the opportunity to simulate different risk scenarios to be used as additional knowledge in the ex-ante phase of urban Plan formation in order to evaluate the proposed planning choices.KeywordsCrime riskParametric modelUrban planning