Ipswich CPTED Project - Background
Location and Characteristics of the Ipswich City Council Area Ipswich is located centrally between the Gold Coast and the Sunshine Coast and is a 40 minute drive west of Brisbane. Ipswich City Council is Queensland’s fourth largest local government with an area of 1205km2 and in the order of 135,000 residents. Renowned for its coal mining capacity, Ipswich was also once a major centre for cotton farming, wool manufacturing and rail industries. Today, Ipswich comprises a diverse economy led by professional services including finance, business, education, health and community services.
Ipswich is undergoing a remarkable period of growth and modernisation, as evidenced by the development of the University of Queensland Ipswich Campus adjacent to the Ipswich Central Business District (CBD) and the Springfield development in Ipswich’s eastern suburbs. Springfield is the largest master planned residential development in Australia.
Ipswich City Council’s Support for the CPTED Concept and Background to Initiation of the CPTED Project
Ipswich City Council has recognised that crime and the perception of crime are important issues for the community and also have major impacts on people’s standard of living, development and the City’s image. Council had the desire to take a proactive approach to crime prevention designed to reduce the opportunities for crime to occur, improve informal surveillance and enhance the community’s safety and security. It has recognised that there are a number of crime ‘hotspots’ within the City such as the CBD, railway stations and surrounds, car parks, and areas where licensed premises are concentrated, and types of development that are more vulnerable to criminal or anti-social behaviour.
It is in this context that the Ipswich CPTED project was initiated to ensure that an adequate formal means existed to ensure good urban design incorporating CPTED principles was incorporated into new development proposals, to assist in reducing the opportunities for crime to take place and make the act of committing a crime or undertaking anti-social behaviour less attractive. Council did not view the Ipswich CPTED Project as a panacea to urban crime. Council views it as a very important complementary ‘tool in the toolbox’ of Council’s broader multi-faceted community safety strategy, Safe City, which aims to confront unacceptable levels of crime and violence by involving community members, strategies, networks and committees to create and expand opportunities for all people to live, work, socialise and play without feeling threatened or harassed.
With this in mind, Council sought and received funding from the Qld Department of Housing’s Community Renewal Program for the Ipswich CPTED Project with in kind support by Council.