Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design Emerging Themes, Race/class And The Design Of Peel Youth Village

This paper examines the design strategy CPTED (Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design) and critiques its implementation through a case study in a certain space within the City of Mississauga, Ontario. A concept that continues to gain credibility within urban design and law enforcement circles, CPTED has been incorporated into many municipalities' official plans, Mississauga being one of them. Through interviews with proponent practitioners of CPTED and a case study of the Peel Youth Village, I identify three key themes inherent in every argument as to why CPTED should be the strategy of choice: safer environments as paramount above all else; strategies as common sense, simple and obvious solutions to problems; and modern, updated, and aesthetically pleasing environments as inherently safe. What these themes fail to take into account is the racial and class consequences that can result from implementation of CPTED strategies, with little or no attempt to acknowledge and rectify these issues. A case study of the Peel Youth Village is examined as a recent project to highlight how these themes played out through the development and evolution of the space. I then examine CPTED within a larger governmental framework and look to address why race and class considerations, as well as a lack of an inclusive participatory process exists within a framework that has proven statistically somewhat effective and seemingly "common sense", and conclude by offering ways in which CPTED may look to remedy the aforementioned oversights of race and class, while continuing its effectiveness