Glossary Street harassment Street harassment refers to unwanted remarks and abuses that take place in the public sphere received from a stranger and include from ogling, whistling, and touching to a violent crime such as assault or rape (Gardner, 1995). Sexual harassment Sexual harassment is defined as a violation of the physical integrity and/or autonomy which is related to the primary and secondary sexual characteristics of a person. (Macmillan, Nierobisz and Welsh, 2000). Sexual harassment is often used in private environments such as work or institutional spaces. Sexual assault Sexual assault includes any unwanted sexual contact. It mostly include sexual touching but any sexual threats can be considered as sexual abuse. (Sexual Offenses Act, 2003). Sexual violence Sexual violence is "any sexual act, attempt to obtain a sexual act, or other act directed against a person’s sexuality using coercion, by any person regardless of their relationship to the victim, in any setting.� (WHO, 2017) Rape The Sexual Offenses Act (2003) states that rape is the penetration of the vagina, anus or mouth of another person with a penis when consent has not been given and the offender do not reasonably believe that the victim consents.
The problem
Almost all over the world, women are concerned with fear of violence in public spaces. The global statistics are alarming: one out of three women have experienced physical or sexual violence at some point of their lives (United Nations, 2015). Women make up 90% of the victims of sexual crimes and 99% of those imprisoned for these crimes are male (Eurostat, 2015).
The problem
The least severe but most regular kind of gender violence is street harassment and it is defined as unsolicited compliments, noises and physical abuses that take place in the public sphere received from a stranger. The importance of analysing these occurrences is that they can lead to a violent crime such as assault, rape or a murder (Gardner, 1995).
The problem
Fear of physical and sexual violence weakens women’s autonomy, freedom, and enjoyment in the public sphere and confines their overall development (Day, 1997). The fact that women change their behaviour and their routines in order to avoid certain areas is a compulsory reason to search for a socio-spatial explanation behind these events. Therefore, this study analyses the general perception of the fear of street harassment and the relation between street morphology and sexual offenses in Central London.
Methodology
Methodology
The theory Rendell, Penner and Borden (2000) criticised society’s image and how it views most cities through male eyes and how they are designed for them. Any other gender is deeply affected by public space, work environments, transportation systems, neighbourhoods and housing design. These lives are viewed as second class in the access, usage and daily activities in public space.
Safety is a second-ranked necessity. (Maslow, 1983)
Fear’s body map. Nummenmaa, and all (2013)
Routine activity theory. Cohen and Felson, 1974
Global scale
Hypothesis_ People fear generally the presence of male individuals, low visibility, dense greenery, unkempt urban spaces and inactive building frontages most.
Global scale
Global scale
Global scale
Hypothesis_ People fear generally the presence of male individuals, low visibility, dense greenery, unkempt urban spaces and inactive building frontages most.
Global scale
Hypothesis_ People fear generally the presence of male individuals, low visibility, dense greenery, unkempt urban spaces and inactive building frontages most.
Global scale
Hypothesis_ People fear generally the presence of male individuals, low visibility, dense greenery, unkempt urban spaces and inactive building frontages most.
The hypothesis is partially accepted because people fear more the presence of male individuals (67 - 92), low visibility (57 - 79), buildings with no windows nor windows (64) but not dense greenery (48) or unkempt urban spaces (57).
City scale
Hypothesis_ The more segregated the street, the more a violent and sexual crime can happen.
City scale
From the visualisation, it appears that the higher values are located in the more integrated streets whilst the less frequent ones are spread from integrated to segregated street segments. Based on this assumption, this was tested statistically.
Hypothesis_ The more segregated the street, the more a violent and sexual crime can happen.
City scale In order to determine which syntactic values were associated to the presence of VS offenses, normalized choice (NACH) and integration (NAIN) were correlated with the crime counts. The dependent variable used was crime counts per street segment and the sample size was 580 cases.
The correlation between NACH and NAIN radius n and the crime count is not significant. The correlation between NAIN radius 1500m and street crime is significant with an R of 0.158. In addition, a linear regression was modelled with both variables. The results showed that NAIN r1500m has an R Square of 0.007, which means that by one unit change in the amount of crimes, 7% can be considered to be due to the street’s global integration. The hypothesis is rejected –street segments that are globally more integrated tend to have higher offense occurrence.
Segment length Another idea that was voted fear-positive in the global scale were short lines of sight (ranking 57). Therefore, street segment’s length was statistically tested to determine if it relates with crime counts. As Table 3 shows, segment length is inversely correlated to the counts per crime, meaning that the shorter the street segment, the more cases of VS offenses.
Street segment length correlates inversely to crime counts in this scale, which means that the shorter the street segment, the more cases of VS offenses can happen. Multiple Regression Models Since normalised integration radius 1500 (NAIN R1500) values correlates with the crime count, three models of multivariate regression with segment length and NAIN (R 400m, 800m and 1500m) were tested (see Table 4). The correlations show that segment length correlates negatively with crime counts and NAIN R400, 800 and 1500m correlate positively (slightly lower effect). The multiple regression is a small improvement on effects (adjusted R2 explains these). In model 1 the adjusted R Square is 0.067, so 7% of variation in crime count may be explained by segment length and NAIN400. In comparison with R of 0.207 for segment length, which R2=0.043, hence segment length on its own only explains 4% of variation. The best model is number 1.
City scale
Hypothesis_ The more segregated the street, the more a violent and sexual crime can happen.
The hypothesis is rejected because it is not statistically significant for NACH and it is significant for NAIN R1500 but positively related rather than negatively as hypothesised. Crime counts are more likely to happen in a combination of short segments and high integration values in a pedestrian scale.
Local scale Hypothesis_ In Soho, there is a set of hypotheses: a) As in the city scale, the more segregated the street, the more a violent and sexual crime can happen. b) Men are expected to be found more than women moving on the streets. c) The less visible a street is, the more a violent and sexual crime can happen.
Local scale
Social aspects A comparison between the week and weekend day observations is presented. As seen, there were more pedestrians present on a weekday (118 596) than on a weekend day (112 592). The most frequented streets, in order, were Shaftesbury Street (consistent with its NAIN R400 value, 2.02), Wardour Street A (1.89) and Old Compton Street (1.7). Pedestrian’s gender was recorded. The results show that there is an overall male predominance on Soho’s streets usage. On weekdays, males dominated 28 streets, for example: Winnet St. (69%), Tisbury Court (69%) and Peter St. (67%). On weekends, males overshadow females in 26 streets (out of 30). On the other hand, male are dominant that doubles that of females in Winnet St (81%), Walkers Court (68%) and Bateman St B (66%).
Boxplot of visibility integration and crime counts. Author
Visibility Low visibility, derived from the global survey, was rated as a fear-positive factor. The result of a visibility integration analysis of Soho is shown in Figure 26. The most visually integrated streets are Regent (4.29) and Oxford Street (4.63). The second ones are Charing Cross (3.19) and Wardour Street (3.39), where 51 sexual offenses were reported in total. Streets with medium values (2.61-295) have 21 crime spots, less visible ones (1.60-1.94) have multiple crime cases (25 crime spots). Also, it multiple crime spots are located on street corners. In order to define which visibility values concentrate more cases of VS offenses, a box plot graph was generated grouping the values in 5 categories (figure 27). In the area, the most visually segregated streets are more likely to present a violent and sexual crime.
Segment length and crime counts boxplot. Author
Segment Length According to the global survey, narrow pathways and short lines of sight were voted as fear-inducing. In relation to the first one, a concentration is found near Regent and Great Windmill Street. In both cases there incidents of sexual violence were reported (52 and 35 cases). However, Shaftesbury Avenue and other main streets are wide and more than 300 counts of crimes were reported in these locations. However, short lines of sight depends on street length. Hence, a boxplot with street’s length and crime counts was produced. In congruence with the city scale, the higher count of VS offenses were located in shorter segments (1-30m).
“Harassment arrives in busy streets whereas I am really scared of quiet and small streets.” (Soho’s survey participant, 2018) Fear of street harassment was directly surveyed in Soho. In order to contemplate their perceptions a categorisation with the survey’s colours used was completed. The participant’s evaluation of the streets pointed to multiple interpretations of fear of street harassment in the area. Nevertheless, the majority (65%) agreed that most integrated streets, such as Shaftesbury Avenue (70%) and Wardour Street (50%), are perceived as fear-negative. This is contradictory to Chapter 5, since on the city scale, integrated streets showed significant higher cases of sexual offenses.
Local scale
Hypothesis_ In Soho, there is a set of hypotheses: a) As in the city scale, the more segregated the street, the more a violent and sexual crime can happen. b) Men are expected to be found more than women moving on the streets. c) The less visible a street is, the more a violent and sexual crime can happen.
The first sub-hypothesis is rejected because the streets that presented the higher amount of VS cases were in a middle range of integration. However, the second one is accepted, men are the predominant users of the area (out of 30 streets, 28 were male-dominated on a weekday, and 28 on a weekend sample). Finally, the last one is also accepted because the analysis showed that sexual offenses were more likely to happen in the less visibly integrated streets.
Discussion
Conclusions
Globally, the conclusion is that even though the most voted component of the survey were the social components of it, the spatial layout analysis showed how interrelated they are. Violent and sexual crimes are the third most frequent crime in Central London. Hence, this study provides high value to the authorities and to London’s society in general because this methodology can be replicated in different areas of the city. Moreover, understanding these crimes will help many users and designers to create more welcoming and fear-negative environments for women, based on the conditions that have been found as fear-inducing in this study. The detailed study of Soho allowed testing the global abstract ideas and their relationships. These results can help policy and urban designers to know the specific factors that need to be addressed when designing. In addition, one important method learned from the study was contact and observe the actual usage of the area’s urban space in order to have an inner and personal perspective of the experience of walking these streets.
Further Analysis
Different types of analysis that can be developed from this research. One example is the experiment of testing and recording the behaviour and reactions women have in urban spaces. Another analysis that can be followed is the visual perception of the fear of sexual crime, this was part of the pilot study of this investigation. Actually, a comparison between urban situations in London would be interesting to identify specifically which are the situations that women perceive as fearful in relation to street harassment. Finally, this investigation has provided the factors that combined characterise the fear women feel while walking in certain conditions. The understanding of this fear may be used to empower society to change urban physical aspects that give the opportunity for street harassment and sexual crimes. Only then, and with a social agreement of the importance of women’s equal freedom and enjoyment of the urban space, will changes be seen.