Crime Reduction - Helping to Reduce Crime in Your Area

This guide has been designed to help the crime prevention practitioner, the building manager and the resident. It describes the problems associated with recessed doors and sets out why doors are recessed. Finally it suggests a number of ideas or 'Plans' that can be used to either remove the recess altogether or to make alterations to the doors in order to eliminate or reduce the problems associated with the recess.

Title: The Recessed Pest - Reducing Crime Opportunity in Recessed Doorways: A Guide for Residents, Building Managers and Crime Prevention Practitioners
Authors: Calvin Beckford, Metropolitan Police, and prepared in partnership with Camden Council and The London Fire Brigade
Number of pages: 13
Date published: May 2002

Most people living or visiting inner cities will be familiar with the problems that recessed doorways can present - rough sleeping, street drinking, drug use, prostitution, and quite often as repositories for rubbish, hypodermic syringes and human waste. The author argues that recessed doorways actually cause crime and anti-social behaviour and that removing a recessed doorway removes the opportunity to commit a crime.

Contents

• The Problems with Recessed Doors

• Recessed Doors and Drug Users – The Problems at Their Worst

• Why Are My Doors Recessed? The Regulations

• The Building Manager's Responsibilities

• What You Can Do About It - The Plans

• Other Recess Matters

The author points out that although the information in the guide is based on Building Regulations and Legislation correct at the time of going to print, that the interpretation of the legislation may differ slightly in your local authority area.

Getting a copy

The Recessed Pest - Reducing Crime Opportunity in Recessed Doorways: A Guide for Residents, Building Managers and Crime Prevention Practitioners PDF 273 Kb. Note that this is a revised version, first published November 2002.