Building Security

What connections are there between physical form of neighborhoods and human behavior?

It is necessary to consider the safety and security of facility users under abnormal, as well as normal, conditions and for design or management staff to examine their facility plans for both potential trouble spots and characteristics that facilitate help when problems do arise.

Designers and managers of public parks and plazas use many different methods to maintain the security of these places. Reviewing these  can allow designers to take a comprehensive approach to public space security.

Does having a mobile phone make us safer?  Does a cell phone lead us to behave in a safer way?

Two pilot studies provide interesting insight into how people feel about active and passive antiterrorism measures.

Three articles on how certain aspects of the environment affect people’s perception of danger add to our knowledge about how to make places safer.

New research on pedestrian dynamics offers insight to designers who need to design facilities and spaces for the possibility of quick evacuations.

Neal Kumar Katyal of the Georgetown University Law Center breaks that mind-set and reviews in detail several effective design strategies to reduce crime.