Now with daytime population adjusted crime rates

Deflating or inflating the impact of crime relative to the size of the population has long been a hot topic amongst criminologists when measuring crimes committed against a person. Using static residential population has limited utility unless it is a relatively static area that doesn’t have people coming and going into and out of it. How this translates into every day scenarios is probably best illustrated by the Westminster area of London – an area where the population swells during the day to receive a large daytime working population, a different set of people who hit the bars and restaurants in the evening and then a 3rd set who live there (but may not even work there) – a small fraction of those who are around during the day. With daytime populations adjusted crime rates, areas in Westminster instead of coming top nationally for crime rates come around half-way, i.e. average.

So, we now have daytime population data for the following;

  1. Constituency
  2. Wards
  3. Postcode Sector
  4. Postcode District
  5. Lower Layer Super Output Area (LSOA)

These are all available with a subscription and I think daytime-population adjusted crime rates gives a much truer and fairer picture of relative risk, if only because most crime happens during waking hours.

We have also made postcode-matched LSOA daytime crime rates free to view – just type in your postcode to the search box and click on the link – Get Daytime Population Crime rated figures – for the daytime rate to contrast and compare.

 

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