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Security and Protection of Public Spaces
Urban Security
Security and Protection of Public Spaces
Pilar de la Torre, project manager for the European Forum for Urban Security, discusses the forum’s PRoTECT project and the role of municipal authorities in protecting public spaces
Over the years, strategies to protect public space against terrorism have strengthened and evolved, mainly focusing on protecting critical infrastructures. However, terrorist attacks are evolving as well.
As a result of new contexts and opportunities, public space has recently become an attractive target for terrorist attacks. To illustrate, the latest terrorist attacks in European cities such as London, Paris, Manchester, Stockholm, Berlin, Brussels, Barcelona all targeted public areas. These areas are considered as ‘soft targets’; crowded public spaces as metro, shopping centres, sports stadiums, bars, restaurants, clubs and commercial sidewalks, that are easily accessible to the public and an easy target for terrorists with high negative societal impact. Soft targets are targets because attacking them can aid terrorist organisations to obtain their goals, such as threatening the safety and quality of life of the public.
Following the resolution of the European Commission, in the Action Plan to support the protection of public spaces, which states that ‘local and regional authorities are also important stakeholders in the protection of public space’, PRoTECT project aims to raise the awareness of municipal authorities on their role in protecting public spaces and provide them with tools, good practices, access to technology concepts, and the knowledge to tailor them to their needs to better prevent this kind of threat and to act more effectively in case of attacks.
A vision for urban security
The European Forum for Urban Security (Efus) has more than 30 years’ experience, working with 250 local and regional member authorities from more than 16 European countries, in the promotion of a balanced vision of urban security, combining prevention, sanctions and social cohesion, to obtain recognition of the role of local and regional authorities in drafting and implementing national and European security policies. It has the capability to foster the exchange of experiences between authorities for the benefit of long-term security and to support local and regional authorities in the conception, implementation and evaluation of their local security policy. As such, it adds value in its participation in the PRoTECT project for the protection of public spaces against terrorism threats, as well as other initiatives such as the Partnership on Security in Public Spaces of the Urban Agenda for the European Union. The later is one of 13 Urban Agenda partnerships, in which the cities of Nice and Madrid and partners of PACTESUR project that is coordinated by the city of Nice and which aims to empower cities and local police forces to better address current vulnerabilities in public spaces.
Important actors in the protection of public space
Terrorism is a reality in many European countries and a continuous threat to a number of European cities. It seriously threatens the safety and values of democratic states and the rights and liberties of their citizens. Acts of terrorism bring about long-term negative effects for cities and high social costs. Not only from a financial, but also from a psychological point of view in the sense of an increased feeling of insecurity among locals and visitors.
It is the duty of cities to be responsible for the safety and security of their citizens. Local authorities play a key role, in terms of the immediate response in cases of a terrorist act and crisis management, as well as in being aware of the vulnerabilities their public spaces might have in order to be able to adopt appropriate measures to prevent and mitigate terrorist attacks and their consequences (European Commission, 2017). The EU Commission is thus committed to reinforcing the involvement of these stakeholders by promoting dialogue and exchange between national, regional and local authorities and supporting the development of operational projects.
Local authorities in Europe have taken a number of steps needed to protect and prevent their citizens against terrorist attacks. Some municipalities across Europe have made progress in counter terrorism and have adopted measures to prevent and prepare against a terrorist attack in public space. However, in examining the role of cities in the protection of public spaces against terrorism, further steps in this direction are to be taken.
Development of common guidance and the exchange of good practices are indispensable elements of sustainable and effective solutions. In correlation with these considerations, local authorities can play a significant role in the improvement of the protection of public spaces if they are able to: identify and mitigate vulnerabilities of their public spaces, have the specific skills to do so, have knowledge about existing solutions both technological and human-centred that meet their needs, and foster coordination and cooperation between key stakeholders.
Tools to prevent and intervene more effectively
PRoTECT project seeks to strengthen local authorities’ capabilities in public protection by putting in place an overarching concept where tools, technology, training and field demonstrations will lead to situational awareness and improve direct responses to secure public places before, during, and after a terrorist threat. The five EU cities (Eindhoven, Malaga, Larissa, Vilnius, Brasov) are being supported by the Dutch Institute for Technology, Safety and Security (DITSS), the Lithuanian Centre for Cybersecurity (Lietuvos Kibernetiniu Nusikaltimu Kompetenciju Ir Tyrimu Centras) (LT), the Meleton Asfaleias Centre-KEMEA (GR), the Romanian police Inspectorate (RO), the Spanish Ministry of the Interior (ES) and by networks as the European Network for Law Enforcement Technology Services (ENLETS) and Efus.
The project aims to provide cities beyond the project with an actionable perspective on the protection of their public spaces and other soft targets, by equipping them with good practices and access to technology concepts, and the knowledge to tailor them to their needs. It aims to build a closer, permanent collaboration between municipal authorities and law enforcement agencies via existing networks (ENLETS, Efus).
Expected outcomes are risk and cost reduction related to the protection of public spaces for municipalities and Law Enforcement Agencies (LEAs) and implementation of a pan European technology capability assessment tool for cities.
The project has been implemented for more than a year and already has a series of tools which are being tested by the partner cities to facilitate the protection of public spaces, providing city partners with tools to conduct both a vulnerability self-assessment and technology assessment in their municipalities.
Vulnerability self-assessment
The PRoTECT project is based on the EU Vulnerability Assessment Tool (VAT), developed by the DG HOME (2019), the objective of which is to support actors engaged in counter terrorism strategies at the national level to assess the vulnerability of a specific public space. PRoTECT has developed a Manual of the VAT addressed to Municipal staff that is responsible for safety and security in public space and other local stakeholders involved in the security management of public spaces. It aids them in identifying vulnerabilities as a result of the risk identification and risk analysis processes.
The areas identified as public space have to be areas where regular and/or incidental masses of public come for an activity. The activity at the main site can lead to other congested areas around the main site (e.g. an access road to a sports venue). These surrounding sites should also be taken into consideration when conceiving a security plan for the main site. In the project, the main site, together with the surrounding sites associated with the activity, are called the Public Space of Interest (PSOI).
The manual provides the steps that have to be taken, to do a vulnerability assessment as part of the security management process. Users of the tool will be able to identify the following elements necessary to assess vulnerabilities of a PSOI: characteristics of the site, existing security measures, potential threats, consequences and probabilities. These elements will contribute to analysis and take measures in terms of technologies, infrastructure and human resources.
Technology assessment framework
In order to ensure that the most adequate and fit solutions are selected to respond to the specific needs in a city, a technology evaluation framework (the EU TEF) has been developed. This tool is derived from previous EU H2020 projects.
The EU TEF is meant for municipal staff responsible for safety and security in public space and other relevant stakeholders, such as municipal police, urban planners, security department or crime prevention units, event organisers, tourism and transport operators etc. The TEF aids municipalities in the whole process of building on specific vulnerabilities and gathering potential technologies, evaluating these for specific vulnerabilities at a specific public space of interest against terrorism.
It consists of eight steps which aid in focusing on relevant vulnerabilities from their own EU VAT results, deciding on relevant criteria, setting up the terms of reference for technology requirements, evaluating the (technology) results and performing demonstrations in their cities. The EU TEF provides an overview of how to go from one prioritised vulnerability to asking the market for solutions to protect a public space of interest against a terrorist threat.
Conclusions
In this context, the involvement of local and regional authorities through targeted guidance (provided both by private sector actors and peer local authorities) on the protection of public spaces plays a key role in the operationalisation and implementation of good practices and thus in the development of effective solutions.
Based on the assumption that for efficient protection of public spaces it is necessary to involve a wide range of stakeholders from the local level, PRoTECT develops a tailormade methodology outlined in four steps: vulnerability assessments; identification of needs in terms of technologies to launch a request for solutions; evaluation, validation and verification of technological solutions to mitigate vulnerabilities with the support of a hypothetical scenario; and hold demonstrations of proposed technological solutions.
Through the proposed PRoTECT methodologies, local authorities will be able to engage in a decision-making process that involves other relevant local stakeholders usually not present in the local security strategy. This relationship has already been established throughout the Vulnerability Assessment Workshops and will continue during the Technology Evaluation Workshops.
The methodology of this project will be translated into knowledge, attitudes, and skills for local actors in the protection of PSOI. Local security actors will also be able to coordinate the process by themselves. This implies the identification of site attributes, involved stakeholders and actors, considered vulnerabilities, threats and potential consequences, the applicable regulatory framework that will have to be preconsidered by the potential participants of the request for solutions process in order to foresee the technological solution(s) and how these could be used for preventing and/ or strengthening the response capacity of municipalities in a corresponding incident.
In the long term, expected outcomes are to be seen in the following four areas.
Expected outcomes
The first outcome relates to research. The outcome expected is that municipalities, one of the actors responsible for citizens’ safety, will be able to influence the research community and that industry technological solutions will respond better to their needs complying with the legal and ethical framework in place. In this way, technological solutions from industry will be more sustainable and easier to exploit.
The second outcome hoped for is the transfer of knowledge. The work of PRoTECT has built actions and allowed lessons to be learned in different categories of PSOI, such as commercial areas, main squares, places used for specific events such as concerts, festivals, demonstrations or cultural events and concerning the preparedness against different threats such as attacks with sharp objects, firearms, and Improvised Explosive Devices (IED) among others. These lessons learnt will benefit local authorities beyond the project in enhancing their knowledge on the protection of PSOI and will contribute to the spread of good practices.
The third expected outcome is cooperation and awareness raising. In the long term, PRoTECT will foster cooperation with a wide range of stakeholders involved in security at the national and European levels to increase the awareness of managing authorities, local authorities and beneficiaries.
A call for solutions
A call for available technological solutions (termed Request for Information or RFI) will be launched as part of the project. The selected ones will be evaluated on the ground by the five partner cities: Brasov (RO), Eindhoven (NL), Lariseon (GR), Málaga (ES), and Vilnius (LT).
This article includes the contributions of: Tatiana Morales (Efus), Puck va Brink (TNO), Patrick Padding (National Police of Netherlands), Peter van de Crommert (DITSS),George Kioumourtzis (DITSS), and Ioannis Chasiotis (KEMEA).
Further Information
www.efus.eu/en
