Public services and facilities

Public services and facilities are urban objects designated to fulfil supportive functions related to the health and well-being of the citizens of a modern society or urban area.

The provision of public services and facilities in the urban environment thus has a significant impact on the quality of life that residents and others enjoy. Good quality local public services, including education and training opportunities, health care and community facilities, are identified as one of the key elements for a Sustainable Communities Plan connecting with crime reduction and community safety.

Description

Public services and facilities play an essential role in providing support services to create viable,sustainable, healthy and cohesive communities,overcoming social barriers and raising achievement.
They refer to all of the services/facilities which are required by an urban area to provide the necessary and essential functions for its citizens. These include:

Public service/ facility type	Description	Icon
Educational	The land uses and buildings that are used to serve the educational purposes of the community. These facilities very often have a secondary function of providing a location for social and recreational activities of the community.
Health	This category of urban object includes all facilities where medical treatment of some form is offered. For example, it would include a local GP clinic or a city hospital. It is however not limited to clinical or medical healthcare, but all contexts relating to the diagnosis, treatment and rehabilitation of people with sickness/illness.
Government Assets	Buildings and facilities relating to government departments or entities. This would include, for example administration office associated with a government department or agency, police and fire services stations, etc. For the purposes of Urban Securipedia, government assets do not extend to recreational services or utilities such as water/waste/energy infrastructure or facilities.

All of the above perform vital roles within the overall operation of the urban area. The different types of public services and facilities will occur in all contexts of the urban fabric, depending on the role and function of the individual object.

The icon representing the above urban objects will be shown throughout this page where a description relates specifically to that urban object.

Functions

Social

In the case of public services and facilities, societal security should be a natural frame of reference for identification of vulnerability and enhancement of resilience. In particular for this type of urban objects, urban planning practice must therefore incorporate appropriate security measures for vulnerability identification and resilience enhancements of urban objects, including from the societal point of view. Vulnerability assessment should thus take place based on different sets of indicators, from physical to social, and across several levels of reference, from individual to cultural community. We know that citizens’ felt risks to urban infrastructure and needs to protect can be influenced according to ownership structure (public vs. private owners; domestic/foreign owners). This is an aspect of general types of impact of critical infrastucture failure on citizens and society and needs to protect it.

Moreover, public services and facilities can also be associated with citizens’ perception of individual dependence, which can increase their perception of risks to related infrastructure and needs to protect it.

Therefore, related risk assessment for urban planning should identify related levels of risk perception at the level of the citizens as the end-users of urban public facilities and infrastructure for public services. VITRUV identified a set of practical methods for such citizen participation.

Economic

The economic function of social infrastructure is to provide for the well-being of individuals, families and communities. Investment in social infrastructure is essential for maintaining quality of life and to develop the skills and resilience essential to strong communities. There is a growing consensus amongst scholars and politicians that social infrastructure is at least as important for the successful development of a modern economy as more physical infrastructure such as roads, utility facilities, and sewer systems. Social infrastructure such as schools, theatres and sport facilities make people want to live in a certain area, which subsequently attracts businesses and other investors that provide for jobs and income (economic impact). "In short, social infrastructure planning involves minimal resource for high returns".

In terms of security threats, public services and facilities are subject to crime and vandalism. These activities create costs in anticipation of crime (e.g. locks, surveillance, etc.), as a consequence of crime (loss of/damage to property), and in response to crime (police investigation, legal system, etc.).

Apart from the more traditional security measures such as policing, alarm systems, surveillance and regulatory bodies, the ‘designing out’ or 'sustainable design' approach in the earliest stages in the planning process can be in the long run an effective measure from an economic point of view to prevent security threats and reduce the economic damage.

Mobility

Public services generally require good possibilities for mobility, e.g. public buildings should have a good accessibility.

However, in order to reduce safety risk of vulnerable public places such as schools, accessibility might also be reduced on purpose in order to make it more difficult for criminals to enter the place.

In an example is given of a recently-rebuilt secondary school which is unusual in having the grounds unfenced and accessible to the public. It is on the site of a prefabricated school that had many security and disorder problems. The aim was to create a school that students would be proud of and would be safe without having overly visible security measures. This aim has been successful, thanks to a secure building envelope with a single controlled entrance and a comprehensive CCTV system monitored by security guards on 24-hour duty.

Safety

Some public services and facilities contribute directly to the safety, welfare and well-being of people, such as health facilities, fire departments or security forces. Disruption of these services can result in unsafe situations, as people in emergency situations would not receive required help.

Security Issues

Crimes most relevant to public services and facilities, are:

• Vandalism and Graffiti: These security issues are related to the fact that public services often reside in buildings which are publicly accessible, highly visible and which are located in area that add to this visibility. Due to the presence of young people, this issue is most prominent at and around educational facilities.
• 

  Riots in Copenhagen as result of a demonstration in 2006
  Destruction by riots: is a threat particularly for Government assets, as riots can origin from peaceful protests and government assets are likely targets for protest demonstrations.
• Destruction by fanatics can result from the fact that many government assets have a highly visible and prominent position, which adds to their attractiveness in the eye of terrorists.
• Assault is a recent phenomena, which expresses itself in violence against rescue workers.

Measures

The measures for each type of security issue can be found on the respective pages. There are few measures that are specifically suited or unsuited to this kind of urban object, but some general considerations can be mentioned:

• Ownership is required for the public to be aware to enter private space and know to act accordingly.
• Access control is closely related to ownership and one of the most rudimentary measures as it ensures the possibility to determine who does and who does not get access to the office. It is usually enforced by having a reception and a form of dynamic barrier, such as a turnstile, a blockable revolving door or a guard on duty.
• Screening is a measure that can be employed supporting access control. By screening visitors, a more rigid access control can be enforced.
• Directing traffic flows can be employed to ensure only the expected kind of traffic enters via the entrances. Examples of directing traffic flows for offices are: directing all cars away from the entrance by, for example, locating the parking facilities some distance from the entrance, closing parking garages from entry on foot or creating separate entrances for trusted visitors.
• Intelligence can be used to detect increasing risk by fanatics.
• Target hardening can be used to increase the effort to commit vandalism or graffiti. An other form of target hardening can also be employed to delay the effect of riots to the point when sufficient intervention force can be employed.
• Surveillance can be effective against vandalism or graffiti when perpetrators can be detected and corrected fast enough.
• Intervention force is needed to make detection measures, such as alarms or surveillance effective.