Irvine’s Low Crime Rate Due in Part to Good Planning

Linda Brown considers herself a cautious mom.

When her children’s school sent home letters warning of a suspicious man approaching children, she drove her two daughters to and from school.

But most of the time, Brown says, the need for safety hardly crosses her mind. She doesn’t think twice about allowing her 10-year-old to ride her bicycle to the neighborhood park to play with her friends.

“I would never do that if I didn’t feel safe,” said Brown, 36, whose family has lived in Irvine’s Northwood community for the past nine years. “I can’t say I’ve ever felt fear living here.”

Brown has good reason.

State statistics show that Irvine had the lowest rate of violent crimes of all Orange County cities in 1991. The figures, the latest available from the state Department of Justice, also show that Irvine had one of the lowest violent-crime rates of all California cities with more than 100,000 people.

People living, working or playing in Irvine had about one chance in 851 of being the victim of a violent crime--murder, rape, robbery or assault--during all of last year. But move to Stanton and the chance jumps to one in 76.

The secret to Irvine’s low crime rate?

“The principal one is the planned community concept,” said Jim Blaylock, a commander of the Irvine Police Department and 17-year veteran. “Quite frankly, right from the onset, (crime) was always a consideration” for planners.

Urban planners began designing Irvine in the 1960s, when many neighboring cities were maturing and showing the effects of haphazard zoning, he said. In those cities, bars and long strip commercial centers lined major streets near residential areas, and that mixture tends to attract crime, Blaylock said.

Irvine’s neighborhood shopping plazas, however, were designed on the outskirts of each residential “village.”

The design and the lack of a traditional downtown area discourages streetwalkers, open drug dealing and even bank robberies because the city’s banks are hidden within the neighborhood shopping centers, he said.

Irvine’s design, cleanliness and newness make residents feel insulated from the “real world” as well as safe, Brown said. Other areas of the county elicit a different feeling.

“You read in the paper what goes on and you look around and see the tremendous difference,” she said. “I wouldn’t feel safe with my kids to take them in a stroller through a park or do any of those things. I’ve never, ever felt that way here in Irvine.”

The city’s design alone does not lead to the low crime rate, Blaylock said. Those who can afford to live in Irvine are generally well educated and do not tolerate street crime, he said.

“They generally care about their community and what’s happening here,” Blaylock said. “There’s a lot of concern for maintaining the community with the kind of lifestyle that brought them here.”