Langley RCMP have pinpointed the top two areas for criminal activity in the City of Langley.
Data analysis of 91 “atoms,” or small geographic areas, in the City have determined that the number one spot for property and person offences is between the blocks of 203 Street and 204 Street, from Army & Navy South to 53 Avenue.
The second highest atom runs between 201 Street and 203 Street from Fraser Highway down to 56 Avenue.
These two zones account for 17 out of 108 person offences that happened in the third quarter of 2015 and 81 out of 550 property crimes.
The majority of these offences are petty crimes, not serious, Langley RCMP Superintendent Murray Power told The Times.
“We don’t have a body count here, we don’t have serial offenders … there are a lot of things that aren’t happening that we should be happy about,” he said.
Nevertheless, the RCMP have been working closely with the City to look at environmental factors that may contribute to crime.
“Typically where there’s higher concentrations of people, there tends to be a higher concentration of dots on the map. That has something to do with the fact that there is a cluster of businesses there and more people are drawn to it,” said Staff-Sgt. Dave Carr.
“We’ll look at those dots on the map and physically go there day and night and say, ‘OK, why is that happening here?’ Is it a matter of lighting?
“It is a matter of just sight lines? Is it just a good place to hide? We look at all of those kinds of factors.”
The first atom encompasses many residential units, whereas the second, which runs from Save-on-Foods to Gabby’s Country Cabaret to the Stop ‘n Shop Convenience Store is more small-business-oriented.
“In general, the City … it does have an older City core and it wasn’t built with crime prevention principles in mind,” Carr said.
“And so, as the City is growing … we’re starting to experience some of the stuff that happens in a lot of larger cities.
“So we have to start looking a bit closer at ‘OK, why here?’”