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Keywords

Architecture, crime, design, urban, built environment.

Disciplines

Architecture | Business | Life Sciences | Medicine and Health Sciences

Abstract

The accelerated development in the industry of weapons has reshaped the human behaviors, which led to spreading of wars and terrorism. Since World War I, homeless people could not live without making crimes as a source of income. Residential compounds, private proprieties, and public projects have become attraction points magnetizing robbers. Consequently, architects have realized the importance to use design strategies reducing crimes. The scale of crime prevention is varied to cover a single building or a group of buildings. This paper proposes awareness-guidelines for 'architecture against crime' to be considered before setting the urban design of residential compounds in particular. It is a qualitative research based on a theoretical approach defining the meaning of crime then presenting a literature review highlighting previous architectural attempts in crime prevention. After that the paper deducts specific criteria for reducing crimes in the residential compounds. These criteria will be examined through analyzing three public housing projects; (WOES Public Housing in New York City, Sejong Public Housing Development, Sejong City, South Korea, and Abode at Great Kneighton Cambridge Shire Housing Project, Cambridge, UK). These case studies have been selected for implying certain urban treatments and elements that urban designers provided to reduce crimes. This analysis ends with a comparison between the case studies to conclude general guidelines that can be used as a formal code in the urban design of housing projects. Finally, the paper sets a group of conclusions to be a warning alarm provoking architects and urban designers to think firstly and before anything in life safety.

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