Crime Reduction - Helping to Reduce Crime in Your Area

Waterways are an accessible cultural and environmental asset which also act as a catalyst for regeneration and inward investment. They are playing an increasingly important role in the tourism industry as well as becoming popular for residential, commercial and leisure development, all of which impact substantially on the patterns of movement along the waterways and the growing number of different users. There is a growing national awareness of the added value and commercial betterment of development alongside water, and recent major schemes have demonstrated the success and potential for future development. There is a real opportunity to capitalise on this resource and British Waterways are striving to improve access to, and enhance the vitality of, the waterway network. It is important therefore that issues relating to crime and the fear of crime are tackled using positive and long-term solutions to encourage greater and safer use of waterside facilities. These should be designed to be in keeping with the built and natural heritage of this historic transport network

Title: Under Lock and Quay
Authors: Heather Clarke and Chloe Denham with Calvin Beckford, Mark Hankins, Sharon Williams, Ian Gray, Chris Stagg, Mike Manuel, Mike Barrett
Number of pages: 88
Date published: May 2000

Safety and security issues are inextricably bound up with enhancement, conservation and development, yet addressing the problem is often done on an ad hoc basis once development is complete. This leads to ineffective and inappropriate treatment which can have two negative impacts upon the waterway environment:

• creating an environment which can be inadvertently perceived as being unsafe

• changing the historic character of the waterway irrevocably as to make it less desirable to visit.

Design measures to improve security should ideally be included at the planning stage as part of an integral approach to new development, regeneration, and environmental improvement schemes in order to design out crime. Through good design practice and good working relationships between CDRP partners, local planning authorities and designers, the levels of waterside related crime can be substantially reduced. The linear nature of the waterways, particularly canals which have a limited number of crossing points, often result in segregation of waterside areas from their surroundings and increased opportunity for criminal activities to occur. It is often the fear of crime rather than actual danger itself which discourages people from venturing along the towing path.

"Under Lock and Quay" seeks to combine good waterside design practices and crime prevention measures based on a clear understanding of the issues involved, as well as the needs and concerns associated with the different users and uses of waterways. It presents general design principles rather than absolute solutions so as to be applicable across a wide range of sites and projects, and should be read in conjunction with other relevant literature. Examination of the problems and solutions affecting different towing path and waterway users are presented in tabular form for convenience.

This Document relates specifically to the crimes encountered along London's canals and navigations, but the majority of problems and solutions proposed are applicable to waterways in all inner city areas.

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