Gentrification and Crime

A case study of Waltham Forest and Bromley

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In London, different neighbourhoods show "specialisation" in different types of crime.

Compared to the citywide average, some neighbourhoods have higher proportions of crime classified as violent, while others have higher proportions of burglaries or thefts. Criminological research suggests that the type of crime a neighbourhood is specialised in is related to its average income: a relationship that holds true for London.

Each crime type has a different relationship with area-level income.

Relative to the overall share of property crimes in London, burglary and theft are overrepresented in areas with higher average incomes. The opposite can be seen for violent crime, which is linked to socio-economic conditions in deprived areas; and drug-related offences, for which ethnic minorities — who are more likely to live in deprived areas — are over-prosecuted.

Explore how the local concentration of each major crime category correlates with income. info

About the location quotient (LQ)

A measure of local concentration relative to a region, LQs are calculated for a certain crime category in an area. This measure is the ratio between the local share of crime in this category and the citywide share of crime in this category.

An LQ equal to 1 indicates that the local proportion of crime in a category is equal to the citywide share of crime in that category. An LQ more than 1 indicates that crime is locally overrepresented relative to its share of citywide crime, while an LQ less than 1 shows that crime is locally underrepresented.

In this plot, LQs are calculated based on Middle-Layer Super Output Areas (MSOAs) and Metropolitan Police major crime categories.

Data sources

These varying relationships raise an important question:

How does gentrification change a neighbourhood's relative concentrations of different crime types?

We looked at how it happens in two London boroughs that have been gentrifying in recent years: Waltham Forest and Bromley.

Why these boroughs? expand_more

Both boroughs saw significant increases in average income between 2008 and 2018. info

Data source: Office for National Statistics

London Average Year Income by MSOA: 2008
2008
2018
Legend
£20,000-£30,000
£30,000-£40,000
£40,000-£50,000
£50,000-£60,000
£60,000-£70,000
£70,000-£90,000
£90,000+
Population changesexpand_more

Waltham Forest in particular saw increases in population density between 2001 and 2011, suggesting an influx of new residents — an indicator of gentrification.

London Population Density and Employment
Census 2001 - 2011 Comparison

Data: Census 2011, Office for Nat. Statistics. Cartography: citygeographics.

Crime and income changesexpand_more

In Waltham Forest and Bromley, changes in resident population counts and demographics have occurred alongside shifts in the types of crimes that are concentrated in these areas, as measured by changes in the location quotients (LQs) for different crime types.

Burglary LQs decreased between 2008 and 2018. This could be because of the increased security installed by new, high-economic status arrivals in the area, and new and well-developed, secure estates built within the 10 years.

Theft LQs show a significant increase, accompanied by decreases in theft LQs for nearby areas. This could be dependent on the relative difference in economic and social status between new and existing residents, and hence increased opportunity for criminal behaviour.

Similar trends can be seen when looking at LQs of assault and robbery. Although those are observations in line with Aliprantis (2015), Autor et al. (2017) has stated that those are temporary changes in the gentrified area and only occur during the transitional period of gentrification.

Explore how LQs for different crime types changed between 2008 and 2018.

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About the location quotient (LQ)

A measure of local concentration relative to a region, LQs are calculated for a certain crime category in an area. This measure is the ratio between the local share of crime in this category and the citywide share of crime in this category.

An LQ equal to 1 indicates that the local proportion of crime in a category is equal to the citywide share of crime in that category. An LQ more than 1 indicates that crime is locally overrepresented relative to its share of citywide crime, while an LQ less than 1 shows that crime is locally underrepresented.

In this map, LQs are calculated based on Middle-Layer Super Output Areas (MSOAs) and Metropolitan Police major crime categories.

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Location Quotients

Data: Crime in London by MSOA, years 2008-2018

Choropleths describe the Location Quotients of crimes in the area, as used in Mapping Crime for Analytic Purposes, P. Brantingham

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Type of crime:








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