BEYOND FORTRESS AND PANOPTIC CITIES - TOWARDS A SAFER URBAN PUBLIC REALM

In this paper we present a perspective on approaches to enhancing the feeling of safety in the urban public realm. Many planning and urban d esign responses to concerns about a lack of safety in city centres see m often to have led to the 'fortress' city and/or the 'panoptic' city. These are repressive and oppressive, socially divisive and exclusive, and deny the city's inhabitants a richer urban experience. We suggest more positive ways of making city centres feel safer. We start by dis cussing the concept of the urban public realm, then briefly review cri me and incivilities, and outline the spectres of the fortress city and the panoptic city. In the remainder of the paper we discuss positive strategies for safer city centres. By doing so, we seek to offer a res istance to the tendencies towards fortress and panoptic cities. The pa per is aimed primarily at those concerned with the design and manageme nt of the urban public realm, such as local authorities, planners, urb an designers, and city-centre managers. There is also a wider audience that includes retailers, city-centre property owners, the police, and others with interests in the city centre. Although many of the issues have universal applicability, the focus here is on English provincial cities.