This study aims to explore the use of video surveillance for data collection and its impact on the frequency of unlawful behavior in New York City’s public spaces.
In this context, data refers to CCTV surveillance footage, and the term unlawful behavior implies a variety of crimes, along with its multiple subcategories.
First, it will make more sense to describe the nature of public spaces and provide an overview specific to New York City.
Next, the study will investigate how surveillance camera data is collected and assess the potential risks associated with this collection, whether it is authorized or unauthorized.
Finally, it will attempt to identify potential links between surveillance and crime cases in public spaces of New York. It will look into historical data as thoroughly as existing information permits.
Additionally, the study will incorporate visual materials to provide deeper insights into the research question. Interactive visualizations will aid in forming a mental model of either past or future contexts and navigating various configurations of relevant variables. Publicly available datasets will be utilized to supply information and create these visualizations.
Definition and Types of Public Space
To begin, let’s define Public Space(PS), explore its various types, and discuss why these spaces are significant for social well-being.
According to the UN-Habitat (United Nations Human Settlements Program) training module report public spaces are multifunctional areas for social interaction, economic exchange, and cultural expression among a wide diversity of people. It takes many spatial forms such as parks, streets, sidewalks footpaths, playgrounds, and marketplaces, additionally, edge space between buildings or roadsides (UN-Habitat 10).
In practice, public spaces can be indoor and outdoor.
World Health Organization (WHO) has a clear definition of indoor public space which was defined for tobacco control purposes in smoke-free indoor public spaces. It means the indoor place accessible to the public, including places accessible by appointment or permission. It can include places such as cinemas, theatres, shopping malls, and many other mixed-use areas (WHO).
Outdoor public spaces are physical settings that are accessible to all individuals without exclusion and are typically characterized by their open, public nature. These spaces include parks, plazas, streets, and other outdoor areas where social interaction, recreation, and community activities occur.
Matthew Carmona, a planner and architect specializing in public spaces, suggests that urban public spaces both influence and are influenced by society. He argues that new forms of public spaces are linked to the shift towards late capitalism and mass consumption (Carmona 158).
Therefore, it can be inferred that the character of modern public spaces is significantly influenced by the socio-economic environment in which they are created.
Privatization of Public Space
It is crucial to recognize that both indoor and outdoor public spaces can be distinguished by ownership. It is essential to consider who owns and thus governs rules within modern public spaces. To categorize it further:
– Publicly owned PS is Space owned and maintained by government entities (local, regional, or national) such as public parks, city squares, streets, and sidewalks.
– Privately owned PSs are owned privately and designated for public use. Examples can be parks, plazas, and atriums within private development.
In the 1960s, New York City introduced the concept of privately owned public spaces (POPS) for the first time. The aim was to provide additional floor space to private developers, who, in return, would develop and upkeep areas accessible to the public.
The widespread privatization of public spaces largely arose from a growing trend of government disengagement from public sectors. This transformation of the economy involved granting more authority to private, profit-driven entities, with the expectation that increased efficiency would lead to the development of public industries.
Privatized PS became a place of free access and interaction unconstrained by the control of commercial and/or state forces, or a space for particularly defined purposes, subject to behavioral norms and control over those who are allowed to enter (Mitchell 115).
The new types of spaces that have emerged as a result are often more restrictive in nature than they have been in the past and can be actively discouraging the types of unplanned activities.
In his article “Contemporary Public Space, Part Two: Classification,” Carmona provides names of multiple authors who suggest that the average American is not keen on spending time with the stranger, thus describing public space as an un-American structure. Some researchers suggest that the type of spaces that are largely preferred in the USA have more focus on entertainment rather than collective, educative, and political purposes (Carmona 162).
As it was mentioned before, privately owned public spaces (POPS) were first introduced in New York City and became a part of the city’s zoning regulations. According to the Department of City Planning, POPS are owned by private entities but are required to be maintained by them. Currently, 389 out of 592 specific types of POPS, such as public plazas and arcades, are located within buildings and have been constructed in exchange for bonus floor areas.
The proprietors or overseers of privately-owned public spaces take measures to make sure that visitors perceive these spaces as safe. As a result, the diverse and inclusive character of public spaces has led to the dispelling of fear towards strangers through management and surveillance (Carmona 158).
Here is the corrected version:
Yellow dots on the map indicate the concentration of POPS, while parks and playgrounds are represented in green sections.
Use the search bar below the map to find a specific POPS, park, or playground.
Surveillance in New York City
CCTV cameras, commonly used for surveillance in both indoor and outdoor public spaces, have the technical capability to collect vast amounts of data. Currently, their numbers are increasing in New York City.
A Special Report by the New York Civil Liberties Union in 2006 reveals that a study conducted in 1998 identified 2,397 surveillance cameras visible from street level in Manhattan. The report states that seven years later, the same number of cameras were found in just Greenwich Village and SoHo (Siegel, Loren, Robert A. Perry, and Hunt Gram 2)
A 2005 survey identified 4,176 cameras below Fourteenth Street, a significant increase from the 769 cameras counted in this area in 1998. In central Harlem, 292 surveillance cameras were observed, with cameras lining 125th Street.
Today, cameras are omnipresent in various locations such as doorbells, cashier stations, self-checkout stations, and even taxis. A study reveals that in 2021, there was approximately one camera for every 4.6 people in the US, a number that continues to rise. On average, Americans are captured by security cameras about 238 times a week (Melore).
To further support the previous point, evidence can be found in a student survey “Are there any blind spots left in New York City” conducted by the author of this paper. The objective was to determine the average number of times city residents are captured on camera while being outdoors. Each instance of encountering CCTV surveillance cameras was documented during the departure from a Brooklyn apartment to carry out daily activities, including commuting to Manhattan, over five business days.
Additionally, the surveyor attempted to determine the ownership of cameras based on the type of building or structure to which they were attached. For instance, cameras installed on residential buildings were categorized as private. The findings indicated that in small sections of Brooklyn and Manhattan neighborhoods, privately owned surveillance devices primarily occupy public spaces, particularly sidewalks, with almost 100% exposure to these cameras (Kutubidze).
business days from Monday to Friday.
The Y-axis displays the categories and the number of cameras encountered, while the X-axis shows the hours and minutes when the
cameras were discovered.
New York City is notable for its widespread use of street video surveillance. The most comprehensive publicly accessible information about camera locations in New York is currently derived from a citizen-led survey of crowdsourced data conducted by Amnesty International in 2022. This survey includes details on camera counts, categories, and their specific locations throughout the city.
The survey indicates there are approximately 25,000 cameras spread across the city’s five boroughs, with about 56% of them concentrated in Brooklyn and Queens. These cameras are primarily affixed to residential buildings, likely owned, and installed by property management companies (Amnesty International 6).
Understanding the ownership of these cameras since the distinction between public and private spaces is blurred might be a crucial aspect, raising questions about when someone has the right to capture images of our faces and bodies on their cameras. While surveillance may offer a sense of security, it also raises concerns about potential violations of privacy.
Data Usage
Volunteers collecting data for the survey identified several types of cameras, including panoramic dome, Pan Tilt Zoom (PTZ), and bullet cameras.
The purpose of surveillance determines the necessary pixel density of the device for either detection, recognition (determining whether a specific individual shown is the same as seen before), or identification of individuals.
Data storage occurs in a variety of settings. Surveillance microSD cards are increasingly common due to their compact size, high capacity, and reusability, making them very convenient. Additionally, cloud video storage has gained popularity for its scalability and remote accessibility.
The volume of data consumed by cameras daily is influenced by various factors including the camera type, resolution, recording hours, frames per second (FPS), video quality, and compression type.
For instance, cameras with 1080p resolution, recording at 30 frames per second (FPS), and using H.264 compression would typically utilize approximately 20-40 gigabytes (GB) per day.
CCTV cameras extensively monitor public spaces in NYC. Civil rights groups and community activists in the city are actively involved in anti-surveillance activism, pushing for transparency and oversight of the New York City Police Department’s (NYPD) use of advanced surveillance technologies. While safety concerns in public spaces may arise from broader issues, the goal is to investigate the impact of video surveillance on crime rates, as will be explored in the following sections.
The interactive map below illustrates intersections with surveillance cameras throughout the city. However, it lacks information about surveillance within park boundaries, as such data is unavailable.
The red dots on the map depict the locations and distribution of CCTV surveillance cameras throughout the city and in relation to parks.
The camera locations were documented by Amnesty International.
Due to technical limitations, only cameras located at intersections are displayed on the map.
Use the search bar below the map to locate a specific park. When you hover over the park’s location, a tooltip will display its crime statistics.
Crime in NYC Public Spaces
Finally, the results from the above findings could be used to evaluate the potential impact on the crime rate in New York City public spaces.
The level of crime in and around New York parks and playgrounds has varied since 2006. The chart below illustrates the trends for three offense levels: felony, misdemeanor, and violation.
Data reveals that the crime rate was higher between 2010 and 2014. Unless earlier complaint records lacked sufficient data, 2006 had one of the lowest rates. Since 2018, the crime rate in parks has shown a stable, horizontal trend, with the lowest rate occurring during the pandemic in 2020.
Obtaining precise historical data on the number of CCTV cameras in New York to observe the yearly increase is challenging. Even more notably, a detailed dataset on surveillance history in New York City parks and other public spaces is not accessible.
Interesting data is available on the NYC Housing Authority (NYCHA) website. In their October 2012 press release, they announced the successful completion of CCTV camera installation at a public housing site in Brooklyn. The release also mentions that since the inception of the VIPER CCTV surveillance program in 1997, NYCHA has installed 6,680 security cameras of varying sizes across 538 buildings in 101 developments citywide. According to subsequent press releases from 2013, 2015, and 2023, NYCHA reported installing 7,680, 12,000, and over 18,500 CCTV cameras, respectively (NYCHA).
A special report by the New York Civil Liberties Union also references the VIPER program, a collaboration between the NYPD and NYCHA that led to the installation of 3,100 camera units in 1997 (Siegel, Loren, Robert A. Perry, and Margaret Hunt Gram 5).
According to an officer, the monitored buildings saw a roughly 36% reduction in crime the following year compared to the previous year. However, the report asserts that a closer examination did not support the NYPD’s claims. It highlights that crime had been steadily declining throughout the 1990s, with the rate dropping from 5,000 crimes per 100,000 residents in 1994 to 3,000 in 2000.
Crime subsections are grouped into three main classes: felony, misdemeanor, and violation.
These classes are further divided into broad crime and offense categories, such as Felonious Assault, Grand Larceny, and Misdemeanor Criminal Mischief.
In addition, the survey conducted by Amnesty International also includes an examination of the controversial Stop-and-Frisk practice, which involves a brief, non-intrusive police stop of a suspect and has been disproportionately used by the New York City Police Department (NYPD) against individuals of color.
It has been suggested that the frequency of stop-and-frisk encounters is influenced by the racial composition of a neighborhood, and a direct correlation between stop-and-frisk and camera surveillance is not apparent.
As previously mentioned, POPS involve not only extensive digital surveillance but also strict control by the property owners to deter any suspicious individuals from the area. Their relative safety is often ensured by the presence of security guards and other control measures typically implemented by managing entities. This has significantly influenced the socio-political discourse around privately owned public spaces. It has been suggested that POPS have, as a result, lost their civic openness and evolved into areas dominated by middle-class culture, prioritizing mass recreation (Carmona 161).
Outdoor public spaces tend to maintain a broader accessibility to the public, and the implementation of extensive surveillance does not appear to be significantly impacting the crime rate either.
Conclusion and Possible Solutions
In the end, exploring additional instances of surveillance data collection in public areas could prove beneficial.
A readily accessible article by researchers from the Technical University of Dortmund examines whether welfare states require privately owned public spaces (POPS) and discusses various related perspectives. The researchers suggest that cities such as Berlin are increasingly embracing POPS (Dahae, Scholten 518). The survey conducted with local planning authorities from Germany’s ten largest cities enabled the collection of empirical data and the identification of key findings.
Several respondents cited a lack of financial or human resources as a reason for partnering with private entities. Others stated that collaboration with private actors is crucial, especially when planning public spaces on properties not currently owned by the city. However, some argued that providing public space should be a municipal responsibility to ensure citizens have adequate public space. There were also concerns about privately owned public spaces (POPS), specifically regarding private control and the potential exclusion of certain groups.
As a component of a project overseen by the Dutch government, a collection of essays titled “Appropriate Data Use in Public Space” investigates the challenges and possibilities of utilizing data in public areas. It explores different approaches and results concerning the collection and handling of data.
Dr. Wijnand Ijsselsteijn from Eindhoven University of Technology(TU/e) whose expertise lies in cognition and affect in human-technology interaction, discusses a shift in government priorities. Initially focused on healthcare, education, public housing, and social security in the latter half of the 20th century, governments are now emphasizing behavioral influence through psychological interventions (Bart et al 39).
An interesting development is the Security Living Lab, introduced in 2019, which displaces traditional security initiatives. Living labs are viewed as a departure from institutional approaches to smart cities(Bart et al 71).
Living labs are collaborative research centers focused on open innovation and user-centered design, operating through partnerships among public, private, and community stakeholders. They are pivotal in the development of algorithmic systems for public services, particularly in areas like public safety, where data is gathered from living environments such as buildings and public spaces. Living labs integrate public and commercial interests with community involvement, using an experimental approach to engage participants unaware they are part of studies. The findings from these initiatives are utilized by public institutions to enhance public infrastructure and by private entities to innovate new products.
Improvements in face recognition technology now enable the identification of facial expressions from video images, allowing for the assessment of visitors’ emotional states in public spaces. The ultimate objective is to predict behavior based on these assessments. In this context, the term ‘nudging’ refers to interventions in decision-making processes designed to encourage individuals to make more beneficial choices (Bart et al 42). For instance, using speed bumps to lower vehicle speeds in residential areas exemplifies nudging. This approach has been actively piloted by living labs to decrease crime, involving collaboration among municipalities, law enforcement, and industry partners to achieve objectives. Tracking visitor movement in specific districts and dynamically adjusting on-street lighting using real-time data and algorithms aim to influence visitor behavior. Nevertheless, the recurring issue of publicly deployed AI systems, such as mistakenly identifying individuals for crimes they did not commit, remains a concern.
The extensive deployment of sensors, particularly AI-driven surveillance systems, raises ethical concerns. The proliferation of surveillance cameras in public spaces in New York is expected to increase, prompting authorities to confront resistance related to privacy issues. While one approach could have been to restrict the installation of these devices through permits, the trend towards smaller and more discreet devices makes it harder to regulate personal data collection.
Currently, it is difficult to establish a clear link between the substantial increase in surveillance cameras and the crime rates in NYC parks, primarily because of the limited availability of comprehensive statistical data on the deployment of surveillance devices. The assertion that cameras enhance safety in the city’s public areas remains controversial.
Works Cited
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Carmona, Matthew. “Contemporary Public Space, Part Two: Classification.” Journal of Urban Design, vol. 15, no. 2, 2010, pp. 157–173. https://doi.org/10.1080/13574801003638111.
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Datasets:
Historical New York City Crime Data. The New York City Police Department, 2024. https://www.nyc.gov/site/nypd/stats/crime-statistics/historical.page. Accessed 6.20.2024
Privately Owned Public Spaces (POPS). Department of City Planning (DCP), 2019. https://data.cityofnewyork.us/City-Government/Privately-Owned-Public-Spaces-POPS-/rvih-nhyn/about_data. Accessed 6.20.2024
Parks Properties. Department of Parks and Recreation (DPR) – NYC Open Data, 2024. https://data.cityofnewyork.us/Recreation/Parks-Properties/enfh-gkve/about_data. Accessed 6.20.2024
NYC Parks Crime Statistics. The New York City Police Department, 2024. https://www.nyc.gov/site/nypd/stats/crime-statistics/park-crime-stats.page. Accessed 6.21.2024
NYPD Complaint Data Historic. The New York City Police Department, NYC Open Data, 2024. https://data.cityofnewyork.us/Public-Safety/NYPD-Complaint-Data-Historic/qgea-i56i/about_data. Accessed 6.21.2024
