Author Tom McKay
Perhaps, it’s because I was taught by the late, great, Tim Crowe more than 30 years ago, but I’ve always held that CPTED is 80% effective against opportunity crime. It should therefore come as no surprise, that I react with some cynicism when exposed to calls for the adoption of CPTED principles in the wake of school shootings south of the border.
The latest call came in the form of a link to an article which was promoted by a well-known, American CPTED trainer and advocate in a Linked-in post of his entitled “Will the Uvalde School Shooting Change How School Facilities are Built”? The article he referenced invoked the name of Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design stating that
“CPTED is something many in the building industry have been studying and deploying in practice for years”.
The author then went on to say that
“the idea is to use elements of the facility design to deter, detect, delay, and defend”
which sounds more like security to me. It then launched into the concept of “crisis architecture” complete with the idea of rapid hardening that envisioned using internal ballistic doors (like existing fire doors) that can be electronically closed.
The author then pivoted back to a more conventional, albeit extreme, form of access control when he asked a person being interviewed for the article about the pros and cons of implementing a “one door in, one door out” school environment as a “security measure”. Needless to say, anyone, who would seriously consider this option, cannot and should not be taken seriously as a CPTED practitioner for any number of reasons be it the obvious concerns for escape including fire codes, as well as caveats commonly applied to the application of CPTED principles.
So why position CPTED as a credible deterrent to an active shooter, just as the same CPTED trainer and advocate did when he uploaded a photo of the Marjory Stoneham Douglas High School Public Safety Commission meeting on June 7, 2018 heralding the start of the CPTED for Schools Presentation. The person responsible for this post then asserted he hopes that
“the Commission sees the value of CPTED and sets it as a design standard rather than voluntary compliance”.
While I have no issue with advocating for the adoption of CPTED principles when dealing with opportunity crime and/or disorder in schools, my unqualified endorsement pretty much ceases there.
And this is not the first time that I have seen CPTED advocates advance CPTED principles as a means to address some of the most egregious forms of violence perpetuated in our society. I once read an article in which a landscape architect, turned CPTED trainer, suggested that the Just Desserts botched robbery and murder in Toronto could have been prevented were CPTED principles adopted and followed. This dubious claim ignored that fact that the murder took place in front of a packed restaurant of people at the time of the shooting and there were no sightline issues at the time of the murder.
The point is that all of these incidents have one thing in common and that is they are the worst of the worse types of crime. To therefore seriously advance CPTED as a realistic means of preventing their reoccurrence is to forget the types of crimes that CPTED was meant to discourage in the first place. It is for this reason that during many of my CPTED classes, I attempt to demonstrate how ludicrous this idea is by holding up my wallet badge and loudly proclaiming “Stop in the name of CPTED!” followed quickly by “not on my life”.
Given the extent to which the concept is now being advocated as an unqualified countermeasure directed at the worst types of crime, I say to those practitioners who invoke it in circumstances such as these to
“PLEASE, Stop in the Name of CPTED!”
or run the risk of CPTED not living up to the hype. While CPTED is, has and will always be a useful concept, particularly as it relates to opportunity crime, it’s use beyond that can be dubious given that armed offenders have been known to be drawn to and take advantage of CPTED friendly environments as they can use these features to their advantage. Such was the case when I studied the exploits of John Laramie, better known as the Tilley bandit, who conducted seventeen armed and dangerous, takeover-style robberies in banks throughout southern Ontario. Laramie was drawn to banks with excellent natural surveillance and access control which was first suggested by the Bank Administration Institute’s Bank Interiors and Bank Robberies 1985 study.
So let’s not lose sight of the fact that CPTED is dependent upon discouraging an offender or perhaps increased the risk of that person being caught. Try telling that to an irrational offender who is armed to the teeth and prepared to shoot so let’s not kid ourselves, and others, otherwise?