The London “Hot Buses” Patrol Experiment

Institute of Criminology, Cambridge University.

Transcript

1. The London “Hot Buses” Patrol Experiment Henry Partridge, Transport for London
2. London’s bus network 680 bus routes 19,500 bus stops 7,500 buses carrying more than 6 million passengers each weekday
3. Crime recording Driver Incident Reports calls made by bus drivers to CentreComm, the London Buses control room, who determine whether an emergency response is required. Bus-related CRIS subset of Metropolitan Police recorded crime extracted using a keyword search.
4. Bus-related crime and disorder The rate of police recorded crime on public transport has fallen each year since 2005/06 and remains at record low levels. There were 7.5 crimes per million passenger journeys recorded on London’s bus network during 2013/14 which represents a 65.3% drop since 2005/06. • • • • • • • • • • 0 10000 20000 30000 40000 2004/05 2005/06 2006/07 2007/08 2008/09 2009/10 2010/11 2011/12 2012/13 2013/14 Count of bus−related crime • • • • • • • • • • 0 5 10 15 20 2004/05 2005/06 2006/07 2007/08 2008/09 2009/10 2010/11 2011/12 2012/13 2013/14 Rate of bus−related crime
5. Bus-related crime and disorder The majority of police recorded bus-related crimes relate to incidents of theft and public disorder.
6. Operation Menas
7. Targeting Police should conduct and apply good research to target scarce resources on predictable concentrations of harm from crime and disorder (Sherman, 2013)
8. High crime bus routes pass through high crime areas (Pearlstein & Wachs 1982; Newton 2008) Bus stops are crime generators (Roman 2005; Weisburd et al. 2012) Crime is concentrated at a small number of bus stops (Loukaitou-Sideris 1999; Newton & Bowers 2007) • 0.05% (n=10) of bus stops in Los Angeles accounted for 18% of bus stop crime • 20% of all shelter damage in the Wirral occurred at 2.5% of all shelters Crime is more common at bus stops than on board buses (Levine 1986) Targeting research on bus-related crime
9. 4% of bus routes (30 out of 680) accounted for approximately 20% of DIRs in 2013 1.5% of bus stops (300 out of 19,500) were associated 27% of DIRs* in 2013 Targeting spatial concentration * DIRs recorded during 2013 (N=45,324) that were matched with iBus route run data 59.5% (N=26,954) and were within 200m of a matching bus stop (n=23,245).
10. Driver Incident Reports are most frequently reported between 15-2000 hours each weekday and between 00-0600 hours at weekends Targeting temporal concentration
11. Targeting site identification High frequency Count of ‘Community Safety’ Driver Incident Reports enriched with route run information from iBus data Temporally stable Coefficient of variation (Johnson et al. 2008) Crime generator Incidents that resulted in a police dispatch
12. Testing Once police choose their high-priority targets, they should review or conduct tests of police methods to help choose what works best to reduce harm (Sherman, 2013)
13. Testing research on hot spots policing Hot spots policing is an effective crime prevention strategy (Braga et al. 2012) 15 minutes is optimal duration for police presence at hot spots (Koper 1995) Operation Beck • assessed the effect of police presence at ‘hot’ London Underground platforms • recorded a 20% reduction in calls-for service at the treatment platforms compared with the control platforms (Ariel & Sherman 2014)
14. Testing general hypothesis Directed police patrols at high crime bus stops between 12-1900 hours will reduce crime levels compared to bus stops with no police presence
15. Testing experimental design • Multisite randomised controlled trial across London • Random assignment of sites to 3 blocks to Treatment and Control • Intervention delivered by pairs of PCs and PCSOs • 3 x 15-minute patrols, Monday- Friday 12-1900 hours at treatment sites with on board patrols along contiguous bus route runs • “Business as usual” at the control sites • Duration: 6 months
16. Tracking Once police agencies use research to target their tested practices, they should generate and use internal evidence to track the daily delivery and effects of those practices, including public perceptions of police legitimacy (Sherman, 2013)
17. 1 Inspector, 2 sergeants Detailed patrol patterns Weekly briefings Tracking monitoring the dosage
18. GPS devices issued to each pair of officers Tracking monitoring the dosage 48250 50538 47914 Code Name Visits Duration 48250 Rosslyn Park Rugby Football Club 3 15 mins 50538 Wimbledon Station 2 36 mins 47914 Southside Shopping Centre 2 10 mins Patrol D: 4 August 2014
19. Tracking results Total N of minutes in hots pots (6 months): 3 buffer sizes, experimental vs. control Total N of visits in hot spots (6 months): 3 buffer sizes, experimental vs. control
20. Tracking results Buffer size % change p-value 50m -38 p<.001 100m +1 p=.889 150m +23 p<.001 Change in levels of Driver Incident Reports between Treatment and Control sites Estimated Marginal DIR Means using Network Buffers (based on GLM model with Poisson distribution)
21. The London “Hot Buses” Patrol Experiment Henry Partridge, Transport for London