Urban park settings and crime: Influencing community perceptions of safety and park use

Abstract

The aim of the research was to explore whether criminal events and the physical arrangement of park settings influence the community’s perception of safety, and ultimately their usage of urban parks. Community perceptions of personal safety and park use were examined in urban park settings within a regional city of South East Queensland, using a 2 x 2 (reported crime incidents: high or low levels x park setting: inviting or uninviting) Factorial Design. Park settings were evaluated using Kaplan, Kaplan and Ryan’s (1998) eight patterns of fear and preference. A Pearson Productmoment correlation revealed that participant scores for perception of safety were independent to scores for park use. ANOVA revealed that there was a significant difference in participant scores for personal safety, between settings classified as either inviting or uninviting. The difference in participant scores for personal safety, between settings classified as experiencing either high or low levels of crime incidents, was not significant, with no interaction effect. ANOVA also revealed that while there was no significant difference in participant scores for park use between settings classified as inviting verses uninviting, or between settings classified as experiencing high levels verses low levels of reported crime incidents, there was however a significant interaction effect. When parks experience high levels of crime, reported park use was greater when the setting was inviting than uninviting. No gender or age differences were detected for any of the dependent variables. The research findings support previous research that found perceptions of personal safety are related to the physical characteristics of park settings, and also that park use and perceptions of safety are independent to crime incidents. The research demonstrates that while crime incidents may not have a significant influence, the physical characteristics of park settings play a very important role in promoting positive perceptions of safety within the community. The implications are that future design and management of park settings should consider Kaplan, Kaplan and Ryan’s (1998) eight patterns of fear and preference to promote positive perceptions of personal safety within the community.