map of woe - urban semiotics of risk

8/3/2019 Map of Woe - Urban Semiotics of Risk

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Thou map of woe, that thus dost talk in signs!Titus Andronicus; Act 3, Scene 2


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Table of ContentsPreface...................................................................................................................................................................................... 3Introduction ........................................................................................................................................................................ 4

Background............................................................................................................... 4Aims........................................................................................................................... 5Geographical Context .............................................................................................. 6Overview of Method ..................................................................................................7Quiet Intersection......................................................................................................7

1. Risk A Game of Strategy or Chance? .................................................................................................9Beck and (His) Call Risk Society.......................................................................... 9Power, Corruption, and Lies Knowledge & Regulation ......... ........ ......... ........ ...... 10A Matter of Fact Cognitive-Science Approaches.... ......... ......... ........ ......... ......... ... 11Pay Day The Blame of Risk........ ........ ......... ........ ......... ........ ......... ........ ......... ....... 13

2. City Brakes Urban Stops & Starts ...................................................................................................14A Tale of Blue Cities Zoning & the Decline of Community.......... ........ ......... ........ 14The Good, The Bad & The Ugly Says Who?........ ........ ........ ......... ........ ......... ........ . 15If a Trio in the Jungle Falls-out but No Camera Sees it ........ ......... ......... ......... ...... 17New Order Rhythms of Revival........ ......... ........ ........ ........ ........ ......... ........ ........ ... 18

3. Method ...........................................................................................................................................................................20

Methodological Reasoning..................................................................................... 20Sign Language .................................................................................................... 20Reading Between the Double Yellow Lines ............. ......... ........ ......... ........ ........ 21Following the Archetypes ....................................................................................22

4. Which Sign are you? ..........................................................................................................................................24Metropolitan Musketeers Ownership and Surveillance ........ ......... ........ ......... .... 24Rights Justified Telling Tales of the City ............ ......... ........ ........ ......... ........ ...... 28Surveillants Seen and Not Heard From........ ........ ......... ........ ......... ......... ........ .... 33Ghost Writings The Invisibility of Signs...... ........ ......... ........ ........ ......... ........ ....... 38Power Switch ..........................................................................................................40Community Chance ......... ........ ........ ........ ........ ......... ........ ........ ........ ......... ........ ...... 47The Buzz Cut ........................................................................................................... 51Parking Spaces ....................................................................................................... 52Conclusions............................................................................................................. 54


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Appendicies A E........................................................................................................................................................57Appendix A Map of Study Area... ......... ........ ......... ........ ......... ........ ......... ........ ..... 58Appendix B - Terminology..... ........ ......... ........ ......... ........ ........ ......... ........ ......... ...... 59Appendix C Ownership Overlay ........ ......... ........ ........ ......... ........ ........ ........ ......... 60Appendix D Queensferry Street: Ownership ............... ......... ........ ......... ........ ....... 61Appendix E Queensferry Street: Coding Top Keywords ............ ......... ........ ...... 62

Appendix F Interview Transcripts ..........................................................................................................64Respondent A: Overnight Visitor.. ......... ........ ........ ......... ........ ........ ......... ........ ....... 65Respondent B: Resident .........................................................................................72Respondent C: Commuter ......... ........ ........ ......... ........ ........ ......... ........ ........ ........ ... 90

Bibliography..................................................................................................................................................................... 96


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Preface

This dissertation picks up on strands from my previous examination of the semantics

of retail city life; about the semiotics underfoot in the city; about attitudes towards

risk; and media portrayal of risk within the urban environment.

The research focuses on signs and verbal messages within the city: peoples levels of

cognition and conformity, but also deeper residual wider meanings constructed

through density and (over) exposure: I recall as a child being taught to read the

street rather than simply the traffic signs.

I am drawn to differences in urban layout, markings and semiotics, often

documenting their differences in my travels. To me, these seemingly utilitarian

images tell as much of a story of a different culture as its people. They are the nubs

of communication the stripped-down essence, and a peoples interpretation of

their meaning reveals some of a cultures fears, ambitions and hopes.


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Introduction

This research explores the semiotics of risk in the urban environment of the West

End, the Financial District (The Exchange) and the Modern Art Galleries area of

Edinburgh. It will be referred to hereon as The West End for simplicity. Much of

the semiotic is formed from signage relating to awareness and mitigation of identified

risks, but it is a continuum through space, seeping seamlessly into the background

urban environment, and through time by remnants left from previous generations.

Background

The research derived from the researchers increasing awareness, as a daily user and

documenter of the city, of the density of signage and other indicators of risk. Manyof the indications appeared authoritative, but had neither obvious basis nor practical

effect. In short, the usefulness and localised environmental cost of the institutional

sign systems and control mechanisms were contemplated, together with whether

indications within the wider environment were better predictors of risk.

It is a prescient topic on the day of completion of the writing of this document on

26th August 2010, the Press Association carried the following piece, quickly picked-

up by consumer news sources (Satchell, 2010, Daily Telegraph, 2010, Daily Mail,

2010).

The Government has urged councils to cut street clutter by gett ing rid of

unnecessary signs, railings and advertising hoardings.

Ministers are worried the character of urban spaces is being damaged

the removal of street clutter from Kensington High Street in west London

had reduced accidents by up to 47%. (Press Association, 2010)

By midday, the media had sensed the smell of risk and on BBC News at One, the

Secretary of State for Communities, Eric Pickles MP was filmed in Piccadilly Circus,

London, saying:

Its about putt ing up barriers to prevent people crossing; it s about crushing

pedestrians; its about treating them like cattle; its about barriers that cyclists

could get themselves crushed against; its about open things up instead,


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making people use the streets as they was [sic] intended to do, which is to

enjoy them. (BBC News, 2010)

However, matters of communities, roads and local authorities are devolved to The

Scottish Government within the United Kingdom, though there are no obvious

reasons to suspect significant deviation in urban Scotland, except linguistically for the

inclusion of Gaelic on more northerly road signs.

Surveillance also has come under further artistic scrutiny this year, and a visit to the

Tate Modern, London exhibition Exposed Voyeurism, Surveillance and the Camera

was part of the researchers reflection and formation of the topics importance to

any discourse around urban risk.

There is a tendency amongst current research around risk in the urban environmentto adopt the contemporary evolution of risks meaning to be analogous to likelihood

of disaster, and therefore for research to focus on the reduction of that likelihood

(Wamsler, 2004, Wamsler, 2009, Shaw et al., 2009, Pelling and Wisner, 2008). The

existence of risk itself is taken as a given within a cognitive-science perspective: there

is a focus on the assessment and management of risk on populations, rather than its

ambient perception by individuals. On the other hand, the field of human computer

interaction design has turned to ethnographic research in its attempt to understandthe differences of people within an environment, but this has predominantly focused

on actions rather than feelings and meaning, relegating these aspects to hurdles to be

filtered for thetruth. Again, this turns out at root to be rather task-oriented: reduce

risks; increase efficiency. In this sense, this research is aligned towards the Affective

Urbanism movement with its exploration of consequence, effect and affect in people

who use the city.

Aims

I examine here reactions to, and perceptions of, the language and manifestations of

risk, and how it informs interplay with the city. I hope I have managed to interpret

from users of this urban landscape the deeper meanings they associate with the

semiotics and indicators of risk in urban life. This is supported by photographic

documentation of the study area, to reveal any emphasis of risk and safety

paraphernalia; and to allow identification of the public versus the private realm.


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In this way, I hope to move beyond an acceptance of the dangers of urban life and its

ever-more sophisticated and numerous counter-measures, to stock-take what the

evolved city and the perceptions of its users tells us about risk, and what it means

for our presence together in the city.

Geographical Context

Much of the study area has been designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site

since 1995, and part of the New Town Conservation Area with the exception of a

geographically conspicuous triangle formed by Lothian Road, the Financial Centre,

the Caledonian Hotel and the West Approach Road.

Figure 1 - Map (Appendix A Map of St udy Ar ea, for larger version)

Shandwick Place and its crescents were completed by 1825 (The City of Edinburgh

Council, 2005) and to its North a grid plan of streets centred on the wide avenue of

Melville Street. The architecture here is mostly Georgian, with few contemporary

intervals, except towards Haymarket this is within the UNESCO site. To the South

East of Shandwick Place, a buffer of Georgian Architecture reveals the 1970s

development from abandoned railway land to the West Approach Road and later

area known as The Exchange, with various private buildings within an original master

plan by Sir Terry Farrell. This is not within the UNESCO site. Edinburgh City

Council wholly owns the Edinburgh International Conference Centre, and they


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granted their company full planning consent on 18th February 2010 (09/01314/FUL)

to add an extension to the EICC. This has a 34-month schedule for completion. To

the North Western edge of the study area, across the winding path of The Water of

Leith that runs from The Pentlands to the Firth of Forth, sits The Dean Gallery and

The National Gallery of Modern Art. Both are owned by National Galleries of

Scotland and adjoin across a minor arterial road.

It will be seen from Figure 1 that the area is predominantly a vehicular environment,

though threaded with some solely pedestrian thoroughfares, a few of these within

green spaces.

Overview of Method

In the study, the semiotics relating to risk within the urban study area are

photographed and a representative sample analysed. This informed ethnography

interview of its actors the users of the city. They told the story of urban risk.

The current tram works, with its multiple diversions and paraphernalia, naturally

features. Whilst an extraordinary event, the impact has occurred over several years

and has become ingrained in discourses of the city centre environment.

Quiet Intersection

The fields of risk, urban design and semiotics inform my research. It is their

intersections (below) that provide the ripest fruit since though each features in any

cityscape, they draw together in peoples interaction and enquiry with the urban

environment.


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Figure 2: Intersect ion of fields

Each of the fields of Risk and Urban Design is richly populated with research andtexts, but rarely do these narratives explore the semiotics of their intersections. Risk

and urban design together provide a fertile history for my enquiry, and are explored

in the first two chapters; whilst the foundations of semiotics provide a framework

for my methods, and are discussed in the third. Chapter 4 presents the findings of

my primary research, with interpretation of meaning later.


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1. Risk A Game of Strategy or Chance?

What follows in this chapter is an elaboration of how the different theories of r isk

have affected the semiotics of the urban landscape.

There has been a contemporary evolut ion of risk from meaning simply the

probability of an event occurring, combined with the magnitude of the losses or gains

that would be entailed (Douglas, 1994, p.23) to danger; high riskmeans a lot of

danger. (Douglas, 1994, p.24) The urban setting and context of this study follows

that evolution, cutting across the dominant theories of risk.

Beck and (His) Call Risk Society

As the research is anchored within an urban environment, it is the epitome of Becks

(1992) Risk Societynarrative of individualisation, mobility and competition, sculpted

by industrialisation and post-industrialisation. Beck provides a picture of people who

have become increasingly less able to identify the risks they face as risks become

more global and potentially serious in consequence, thus leading to a reduced

capability for individual avoidance of risk and more uncertainty and anxiety. He

paints risks as a by-product of modernisation, and adopts a predominantly realist

approach in submitting that risk approximates to hazard or danger risks are real,

though he does allow that it is not clear whether it is the risks that have

intensified or our viewof them (Beck, 1992, p.55). He posits that the nature of r isks

in previous eras was localised and perceived by the senses and therefore detectable

and resolvable locally, whereas in the contemporary risk society, risks are often

harder to detect and solely local intervention is futile. Assessing these risks is now a

matter of faith in knowledge, but their scope, like that of global warming, is such that

no one science provides definitive notions of their magnitude and resolution.

Compounding this is Becks notion of individualisation, which describes the

introspection of contemporary reflexive biographies that is, we have become

focused on constructing our own paths through life and work in competition with

others because our path is no longer only dictated by our class, birthright, or wealth.

The modern era provides also a greater density of transport options (amongst them

the solitude of the single-occupancy private car), so increased mobility within and

between cities. People moving and travelling for work are thus less rooted in theirenvironment than were previous eras urban residents. The city also provides a locus


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of leisure activities designed to satiate the reflexive notions and desires of its

inhabitants and visitors, who have been released from the monotony of the chores

of industrialisation into a post-modernist society with choices to make about their

free time as well as work.

This conjunction of imperceptible and irresolvable risks combined with individualistic

lifestyles means that the urban population necessarily largely accepts the indications

of risk provided for it, or they adopt apathy through lack of clarity. Discrepancies

with personal notions and experiences of individual risks are subjugated within a

society increasingly preoccupied with the future (and also with safety) (Giddens,

1997, p.27).

Power, Corruption, and Lies Knowledge & Regulation

The instructional signboards that are omnipresent in the urban landscape require the

conformance and self-regulation inherent in Foucaults (2009) concept of

Governmentality. We must give ourselves over to the signboard, and by proxy to

the expert knowledges that dictate the existence and siting of the signboard.

This, combined with Beck and Giddens narrative of unfathomable risks, introduces

us to the notion of a powerful elite. Those who claim to have a measurement of risk,

and a formula for its resolution, are able to determine the behavioural, aesthetic,

space-defining codes to which we conform. This power is strongest when backed by

a political mandate when the electorate have provided their tacit approval of these

codes. And so, naturally, it is in the interest of those elected, to ensure that its

electorate are fully conversant not necessarily in the risk solutions, but certainly in

the risk problems. The UK 2010 General Elections main four party manifestos

(Conservative Party, 2010, Liberal Democrats, 2010, Labour Party, 2010, Scottish

National Party, 2010) had respectively 14, 13, 6 and 3 mentions of the word risk.

The Conservatives and Liberal Democrats, with a total of 27 mentions of risk

formed the government.

The irony here is the conflict with Beck and cognitive sciences notions of

contemporary individual responsibility in navigating the city, we are held

individually responsible for our creation and interpretation of risk. Simultaneously,

we are held to account for non-conformism to the signboards whose component

expert knowledge we can only presume. But the mismatch occasionally surfaces


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for instance, in that uncomfortable feeling experienced by the driver waiting at a red

traffic signal for several minutes at an empty junction in the middle of the night; then

we are forced to reflect on our situation as we begin to doubt the validity of the

indication of risk to which we are conforming.

Thus normally we defer to the signboards, the expert knowledge of their creation,

and where appropriate, to the technologies that sequence and power them. In this

regard, we are again living Becks Risk Society: ambivalent or unknowing of the actual

risks behind the implicit and explicit warnings of their presence.

This brings into play the role of a further risk expert the police officer and

officials who are mandated by the same set of codes that provide the signboards

their authority, to grant exemptions from their tyranny. They are deemed more

capable of assessing risk than are we, and we recognise them chiefly by their visual

semiotic their yellow fluorescence, black & white chequered bands, and badges. In

many respects, they act as organic mobile signboards. In this study, these experts

make appearances in the visitor and residents reflections, and also give their own

perspectives on the urban environment.

The benefits afforded those with comprehension of the urban signscape and its

syntax also, of course, sustain assertions of the empowerment of knowledge(Foucault, 2009, Beck, 1992, Giddens, 1997). By their ability to reach the meaning

and inferences of signs, they are simultaneously in a better position to conform, but

also to exempt themselves from conformity: after all, it is not only familiarity with

expert knowledges, but peoples own experiential or ingrained perspectives that

allow them to judge the risks of the urban environment Lupton (1999) says:

The existence of varying perspectives on risk, among both experts and lay

people, suggests that the phenomenon of risk is a production of competingknowledges about the world. (Lupton, 1999, p.106)

A Matter of Fact Cognitive-Science Approaches

This provides challenges for the cognitive scientists who posit that if a person

understands a populations aggregate risks, they will be able to respond rationally to

communications about their avoidance. So we see multiple campaigns built around

such information especially in the arena of healthcare (Becker, 2007, Alaszewski

and Horlick-Jones, 2003, Iliffe and Manthorpe, 2003).


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The Enlightenment is important in the development of thought about risk. Lupton

(1999) says of it, It assumes that the social and natural worlds follow laws that may

be measured, calculated and therefore predicted. (Lupton, 1999, p.6) If it is assumed

that expert knowledge provides the solutions for risk, then The Enlightenment

marked the beginning of the development of those knowledges, and thus our

understanding of risk. Indeed, it may be somewhat responsible for that blind spot

with regard to the non-logical, less tangible aspects of risk that are nevertheless real.

The irony, of course, is that it also marked the beginning of our experimentation

with factors beyond our ken, and thus the ultimate creation of new risks of the sort

discussed by Beck (2006).

The intensity of the city centre brings many individuals and their risk factors

together with an environment dense in property and ownership. This brings to the

fore the insurential viewpoint of risk from cognitive science, as authorities,

organisations and individuals bet on the product of the probability and consequences

(magnitude and severity) of an adverse event (Bradbury, 1989) damaging their

property or well-being.

This cognitive science probabilistic viewpoint informs much of the directional or

prohibitive signscape around us the signage is provided in relation to a calculated

risk (or in relation to a code or standard which itself calls upon calculated risk). It

also protects authorities, corporations and individuals from the reputational and

financial consequences of not doing so, whilst nominally enhancing safety.

As each individual signboard is erected in relation to a particular risk (or standard

related to a particular risk), there is little notion of consequences resulting from the

multi-layering and proliferation of signage as a whole (i.e. the risk of protecting

against risk). The urban environment thus ends up being treated simply as another

campaigning space for risk, signboards and so on being the media of their

propaganda the higher the calculated risk, the more barriers, poles and boards

must be erected, and lines painted. This is compounded by cognitive-scientific

codification of risk in instruments of statutory obligation The Highway Code

(Stationery Office Books, 2007) is familiar to all licensed drivers in the UK though

the codes it illustrates very often impacts pedestrian users of the city who are not

necessarily subjected to checks of its knowledge.


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Of course, such statutory manifestation of risk prevention depends again on

Foucaults description of our willingness to submit to them, and our acceptance of

the penalty in not doing so.

Pay Day The Blame of Risk

The Highway Code was amended in a significant respect in 2007 to remove the

notion of accident from its pages. The Times Newspaper reported that The word

accident is to be banned from the new edit ion of the Highway Code in an attempt

to persuade drivers and police that someone is almost always to blame for a death

or injury on the roads. (Webster, 2007) This takes us into an important element of

risk. Urban signage is rooted in cognitive sciences urge to communicate risk better

and harder. And city signs fall within other risk discourses too: Beck illuminates ourambivalent acceptance of their implied knowledges, and Foucault describes our

desire to conform to the powers behind that knowledge. But the element of blame

is inherent to all contemporary risk discourses (Lupton, 1999).

The risk business insurance blames in order to attribute the cost of rectification,

and in health insurance there are certain pseudo-morally-oriented exclusions such as

treatment for addictions as the patient is deemed to blame. Inconsistencies abound,

so social dimensions of acceptability come into play. This then touches on Mary

Douglass (1994) more psychoanalytic discourse around cultural blame and

defensiveness against certain behaviours or groups. No Smoking, Private, Fly

posters will be Prosecuted, No Entry become the streetscapes physical

manifestations of this type of exclusion and defensiveness.

Another manifestation of our desire to exclude the abhorrent from our streets is

the police officer and other enforcement officials. Their street semiotic is potent,

and is politicised beyond the obvious connotations of power-play through media

expert quotes like There should be an emphasis on having more police on the

streets, and not in patrol cars, protecting the public from crime. (Bynorth, 2008)

There is a tension with all such high-profile manifestations of risk prevention in the

urban environment: their presence, whilst to reassure and protect against risk,

ironically emphasises risk dramatically. Every semiotic of safety in the urban

environment is thus also a semiotic of risk: the ornate spiked fence, the CCTV

camera, and the community safety officer.


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2. City Brakes Urban Stops & Starts

This chapter demonstrates how influences in urban design have attempted to

mitigate risk through better functioning and improved aesthetics within urban

communities. It charts the voices of those who reflect on cities likeability and

societys fluctuating draw to the city over time.

Nasar (1990) defines the attributes of liked environments as a preference for

natural over built, an affinity with the well tended, a mix of open and defined spaces,

historical associations, and a legible order. The intentions of the New Town grid of

Edinburgh might be thought to fulfil many of these criteria.

The notion of urban design suggests that there is accommodation to be had between

the utility of the city and its attractiveness.

A Tale of Blue Cities Zoning & the Decline of Community

Bauman (2001) reflects on the romanticisation of community and its elusive quality

in safety-seeking (and so in avoidance of risk). Whereas many Brit ish cities are

relatively recently experiencing (and encouraging) resurgence in inner city dwelling,

Central Edinburgh has consistently maintained a high-density resident population

(Figure 3), and it is expected that semiotic traces of this emerge in the research.

Figure 3 - H igh density Edinburgh, W orld H erit age fashion


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The return of residents to redeveloped and repurposed city centres in the form of

nouveau urbanites leads to what Sennett (1996) terms Communities of Affluence

and here he dovetails with Douglas in his assessment that The image of the

community is purified of all that might convey a feeling of difference(Sennett, 1996,

p.36), with the consequence that an era of abundance and prosperity has

eclipsed something of the essence of urban life its diversity and possibilities for

complex experience. (Sennett, 1996, p.82)

Even mixed-use commercial development within city centres tend to lead to

zoned solutions in that the developments themselves are very heavily branded,

ordered, and intended for a common wealth-level and aesthetic, excepting pockets

of mandatory low-income housing (e.g. Quartermile in Edinburgh). This is in

contrast to part of Sennetts solution of: Encouraging unzoned urban places, no

longer centrally controlled, would thus promote visual and functional disorder in the

city.

Katz (1998) describes difficulties of zoning further:

Zoning conflates issues of use, density and form to such an extent that it has

spawned the unpredictability and visual chaos typical of the American city.

Moreover, transportation-dominated infrastructure engineering has sopreferred the accommodation of the car over human beings, that the

intended users of the public realm have been driven out. (Katz, 1998, p.xxi)

This is particularly acute in the American framework, but a pedestrian navigating the

Haymarket or Shandwick Place/ Lothian Road junctions of the study area is evidence

of the preference accorded the motor vehicle here. What is interesting in Katzs

narrative is that he differentiates the human being from the car as if private

vehicles have no association with people, and infers that drivers are not valid usersof the public realm. It does indicate the polarisation that can occur within

streetscapes.

The Good, The Bad & The Ugly Says Who?

In another governmental attempt to codify urban design, clutter, aesthetics and

safety are brought together again under a common moniker. The Value of Urban

Design lists as a measure of value of urban design Quality of the Public Realm to

promote public spaces and routes that are attractive, safe, uncluttered and work


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effectively for all in society, including disabled and elderly people. (University

College London Barlett School of Planning, 2001, p.19)

It is interesting that this particular measure of value was inconclusive within the case

studies of the report. This points again to the illusive, even illusionary, nature of risk

and safety in the public realm. What is safety measured against? How does one know

when there are enough signs, poles, barriers to protect, and how can one measure

the holistic protection or risk introduced from a single intervention?

How one measures risk and safety is affected by how one perceives the recipients

of the risk or safety as innocents or catalysts. The pessimism inherent in regulation

and prohibition is described by Ford (2000) in The Space Between Buildings:

Many planners, developers and lenders have a much more pessimistic viewof modern urban society. They see a society full of individuals just waiting to

misbehave at the first opportunity. The job of good design should be to

minimise contact and so minimise conflict. People need to be protected from

one another so that our modern, busy communities can function smoothly

with a minimum of distractions. (Ford, 2000, p.200)

In this narrative, a public street bench has a very different connotation, chance of

survival, and societal consequence from the optimists viewpoint:

The prourbanists take a very posit ive view of people and society. Writers

like Jane Jacobs and William H. Whyte argued as early as the 1960s that

people enjoy good spaces and will generally behave nicely whenever such

surroundings are provided. Good streets, sidewalks, parks and other public

spaces bring out the best in human nature and provide the settings for a civil

and courteous society. Everything will be fine if we can just get the design

right. (Ford, 2000, p.199)

It follows that different users of the urban environment will each have their own way

of seeing, and thus their semiotic interpretation of urban risk could be expected to

differ.


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If a Trio in the Jungle Falls-out but No Camera Sees it

Jacobs comments on the essence of urban risk in the streetscape:

When people say that a city, or a part of it, is dangerous or is a jungle what

they mean primarily is that they do not feel safe on the sidewalks.

But sidewalks and those who use them are not passive beneficiaries of safety

or helpless victims of danger. Sidewalks, their bordering uses, and their users,

are active participants in the drama of civilization versus barbarism in cities.

To keep the city safe is a fundamental task of a citys streets and its sidewalks.

This task is totally unlike any service that sidewalks and streets in little towns

or true suburbs are called upon to do. (Jacobs, 1997, p.30)

Urban risk is not a passive ethereal aesthetic quality, but is woven into the city

through its elements and its users actions. And here she emphasises the relevance

of Douglass (1978) theories of otherness to the urban environment:

They differ from towns and suburbs in basic ways, and one of these is that

cities are, by definition, full of strangers. To any one person, strangers are far

more common in big cities than acquaintances. More common not just in

places of public assembly, but more common on a mans own doorstep.(Jacobs, 1997, p.30)

Given the inherent and the manufactured gentility of much of the West End, Jacobs

(1997) further presses why our study area is particularly relevant to her view of risk

and safety in the city: The barbarism and the real, not imagined, insecurity that gives

rise to such fears cannot be tagged a problem of the slums. The problem is most

serious, in fact, in genteel-looking quiet residential areas. (Jacobs, 1997, p.31)

We get a hint here too from her of the rationale for CCTV within the city: we

seem to have here some simple aims: to see that these public street spaces have

eyes on them as continually as possible. (Jacobs, 1997, p.36) And an assessment of

the character of this style of surveillance: Safety on the streets by surveillance and

mutual policing of one another sounds grim, but in real life it is not grim. (Jacobs,

1997, p.36)

This is, of course, from the narrative of a pre-CCTV era (1961) and she reveals that

her surveillance consists not of the unknown watching box but its antithesis: a


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substantial quantity of stores and other public places sprinkled along the sidewalks of

a district; enterprises and public places that are used by evening and night must be

amongst them especially. (Jacobs, 1997, p.36)

In other words, Jacobs is introducing us to the notion of surveillance through

participation and frequency; that people usea streets walkways to access its public

places, or to pass through to such places; that the proprietors of such places are a

natural surveillance; and finally that a peopled landscape attracts other people:

Peoples love of watching activity and other people is constantly evident in cit ies

everywhere. (Jacobs, 1997, p.37)

New Order Rhythms of Revival

Jacobs and Whytes optimism has developed through Alexanders (1978) Pattern

Language by the 1990s to The New Urbanism Movement. Peter Katz (1998) reminds

us of the risk-mitigating benefits of early sett lement: For most of human history,

people have banded together for mutual security. (Katz, 1998, p.ix)

His crit ique of suburbia is that it is composed of pods, highways and interstit ial

spaces (Katz, 1998, p.vii). In contrast, neighbourhoods, districts and corridors are

urban elements (Katz, 1998, p.vii). It is possible that Bauman (2001) may attribute

Katzs spectacles a rosy hue in Katzs posit ing that a single neighbourhood standing

free in the landscape is a village. (Katz, 1998, p.vii)

Lefebvre refers also to the village when he emphasises the resonances of the actions

and consequences of actors: Paths are more important than the traffic they bear,

because they are what endures in the form of the reticular patterns left by

people (Lefebvre, 1991, p.118)

The contemporary metamorphosis of this is the roads, paths, clutter and detritus leftin the city for others and successive generations, and he returns us to indications of

risk and potential thrills: Always distinct and clearly indicated, such traces embody

the values assigned to part icular routes: danger, safety, wait ing, promise. (Lefebvre,

1991, p.118)

In other words, he deduces the meaning of routes (or streets), and poses the

semiotic query whether these form a text or message. He instead settles on the

term texture:


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it is helpful to think of architectures as archi-textures, to treat each

monument or building, viewed in its surroundings and context, in the

populated area and associated networks in which it is set down, as part of a

particular production of space. (Lefebvre, 1991, p.118)

Here, he is linking the spaces of the mind of thought and meaning to the tangible

spaces of urbanity. He is laying down the units and components of an urban space.

Katzs village of the neighbourhood has a balanced mix of human activity (Katz,

1998, p.vii) whereas his distr ict is dominated by a single activity (Katz, 1998, p.vii),

and his corridors are their connectors and separators. These titles fit the American

model better than their common British usage, but the descriptors remain valid. Incommon with Jacobs, he sees the street as a destination rather than simply a

navigation channel: communal rooms and passages (Katz, 1998, p.xxii).


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3. Method

Nasar points to why the semiotics of the city are important, since peoples choice to

avoid it is limited: In their daily activities, people must pass through and experience

the public parts of the city so it must satisfy the broader public who regularly

experiences it (Nasar, 1990).

Lefebvres seeking of value of questioning whether the physical street has an

ethereal text or message shares its philosophical quest with Saussures (1913/ 1998)

search for signifiant and signifi the signal and the signified. Both inform the

methodological reasoning in examining the semiotics of risk in the urban

environment.

Methodological Reasoning

Though Saussures value of a sign as being dependent upon its context is drawn upon

here, it is not intended to conduct a semiotic analysis since the researchers

expertise does not extend to that. Strict distinctions between signifier and the

signified are not codified here.

Further, the Saussurian conception of value beingpurelyrelational and having no

inherent presence is not a tenet adopted. In this sense, the research draws more

upon Peirces (1932) triadic notion that the form (in our case physicality) of the sign

itself is important the representamen contributing to the formation of a sign in

association with its object and interpretant. It is Peirces distinctions that provide

the rationale for the methodologies, and provide a route from physical instance of

individual signal to meaning of the whole.

Sign Language

Peirces representamen equates to the physicality of a sign, and so within the study

area, the presence of each signal is photographed that accords with one of

Lefebvres values of danger, safety, waiting or promise. These have consisted of

plaques and facia of buildings; elements of wilderness; indicators of heritage and

artworks; particular icons and language; paint, fluorescence and colour codes; and

lights and beacons. But also indications of transport, vehicular traffic flow and

parking; barriers, gates, posts, fences and channels; distinctions of public and private

space; signs of occupation and use; paraphernalia of security and surveillance. Finally


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too, the lower-order remnants of smoking, lit ter, disrepair and opportunistic

embellishment; and marks of utility and back scene activity.

In some instances, where a single image may not elaborate the captured asset

sufficiently, short video footage exists for instance, the BBC Big Screen in Festival

Square showing a promotional film about Edinburghs desirability.

Naturally, this capture process is subject to filter, and there was rigour in attempting

to ensure that where a particular instance of an asset (such as a No Parking sign)

was captured, that each and every such instance within the study area was captured.

There are exemptions to this rigour (for instance, in capturing dominant street

lighting, but not all lamps, or a part of pavement in particular disrepair), made

necessary by the density or continuousness of certain assets.

Reading Between the Double Yellow Lines

The quantitative analysis the counting and content analysis of captured assets it is

hoped provides some indications of the importance accorded certain types of

assets. In this sense, even an assets prolific existence may be thought to have

significance. It might give clues to the object of Peirces triad: what the sign is trying

to say within its context.

However, it became clear during research that the area selected for study had

produced too many images to quantitatively analyse within the studys timeframe

more than 4,000 photographs and 35 videos. Therefore, a representative street was

selected for quantitative analysis: the entire third of a mile of Queensferry Street

from its merging into Dean Bridge to its junction with Shandwick Place and Lothian

Road. This produced 272 images that were sifted for repetition of the on-street

assets that had been captured. This left 171 unique images, each often illustrating

more than one item, and these were then coded against seven aspects: colour, form,

function, iconography, language (verbal), ornamentation, and state of repair. So each

of the 171 images was ultimately coded against 285 keywords or phrases.

Images outside of Queensferry Street were nevertheless retained for qualitative

analysis and commentary, and these are available separately. Some have been used in

the presentation of findings.

The camera used was equipped with global positioning system (GPS), so each imagehas attached metadata indicating its capture location. The meaning provided through


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these collated proximities was hinted at in what Lefebvre (1991) called the graphic

aspect the pattern formed when a collection is viewed from above:

This graphic aspect, which was obviously not apparent to the original

actors but which becomes quite clear with the aid of modern-day

cartography, has more in common with a spiders web than with a drawing or

plan. (Lefebvre, 1991, p.118)

The modern day technology has evolved from balloon or early aeroplane to allow

us individually to act as a cartographer of the cityscape, and the assets are mapped

according to type, with the thickness of the strands of the web indicating their

density within the paths of the study area. It is for this reason that time is spent in

constructing a computerised map capable of graphic manipulation to represent the

results.

Again, caution must be exercised in the journey from object to meaning; from this

micro to that macro. The researcher is individually capable only of recognising the

patterns of which they are aware, and so may miss patterns that fall outside of this

episteme referred to by Foucault:

But there was a necessity lying at the heart of their knowledge: they had to

find an adjustment between the infinite richness of a resemblance introduced

as a third term between signs and their meaning, and the monotony that

imposed the same pattern of resemblance upon the sign and what it signified.

In an episteme in which signs and similitudes were wrapped around one

another in an endless spiral, it was essential that the relation of microcosm to

macrocosm should be conceived as both the guarantee of that knowledge

and the limit of its expansion.

It was this same necessity that obliged knowledge to accept magic and

erudition on the same level. (Foucault, 2001, p.35)

So it is necessary to expand the methodology to check and elucidate meaning

further.

Following the Archetypes

Peirces (1932) triadic model of semiotics did not directly reference the interpreter

of a sign, but is strongly implicated in his term interpretant. Lefebvres (1991)


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assertion that the path is more important than its traffic because of its enduring

nature is hollow without successive generations of interpreters of their value.

Therefore, the final element of the study concludes the assessment of meaning

through ethnographic discourse with the users of the study area the interpreters

of it. The value of urban signs of risk can only be inferred in the process of selection,

quantification and content analysis, whereas people tell us directly the value of

danger and safety they ascribe in what they say, in the dissonances, and the way they

go about life.

Ten people, in negotiation, were chosen as likely candidates for study. Four had early

logistical difficulties in being interviewed and recorded. The remaining six were to be

interviewed and recorded whilst walking through the study area, so that various

facets and features might emerge. It was decided that three of the people would be

representative of various roles or functions within the cityscape, and three would

represent people having a role relating to risk crudely speaking, they served the

people of the study area. In this aspect, they were archetypes of the urban

environment the overnight visitor, the resident, the commuter, the police officer,

the environmental warden, and the community safety officer.

Formal approaches were made to each, with instructive outcomes. All interviewswere transcribed and redacted to retain anonymity.


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4. Which Sign are you?

This chapter examines the photographic and interview evidence gathered during the

research for patterns and deeper meanings. There were far more data generated

than space to analyse them, so key themes have been extracted for discourse all

data was gathered by the solo researcher, so will subconsciously be an influence.

The zodiac demonstrates our ability to encapsulate notions of complexity into

simple iconography. Even amongst some stalwart realists, we observe a potent

curiosity about what my sign says about me.

This is the nature of the signs of the street in the widest sense that is probed

here: what each sign and its proliferation says about and to individuals. There are

some broad themes that have emerged, and the findings have been segregated into

these.

Metropolitan Musketeers Ownership and Surveillance

And now, gentlemen, said dArtagnan, without stopping to explain his conduct to

Porthos, All for one, one for all that is our motto is it not?

And yet said Porthos.

(Dumas, 1998/ 1844)

DArtagnan touches here on the virtue of giving oneself and ones property to a

community, but Porthos hesitation is indicative of the misgivings that accompany

such philanthropy especially in relation to property. Granting provisional access (or

selling) is more usual now where land is concerned. Where philanthropists for

public good once gave tracts of land with consequent commemorative artworks,

the contemporary land-based equivalent is the pseudo-public space with

commemorative branding and its various signs of ownership. Time and behaviour

based access is temporarily provided, but power and control is assertively retained

by the benefactor through surveillance.

The photography of the quantitative focus area shows the classic signs of ownership

(and particular the boundaries) to be railings, spikes, hedges, walls and gates;

recessed doorways; chains and locks; flags, pendants and branded facia; closed circuit

television (CCTV) cameras and the notices of their presence and purpose; and


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dramatic changes in relief of the landscape (Appendix D Queensferry Street:

Ownership). The signs are also sometimes referred to as risk assets in this text.

These signs of ownership are reflected too elsewhere within the wider study area,

particular heavily stated within the bounds of The Exchange area, mostly in the form

of CCTV notices revealing the surveillant as predominantly Standard Life (Figure 4).

It is interesting here to note the layers of subterfuge around surveillance within the

main public-access area (Exchange Square to Conference Square) firstly, the

passive language with lack of first or second parties images are being monitored

and recorded for rather than we are recording you for An entirely separate

paragraph states ownerships of this system, and the notice itself is in the form of

heritage-style brass plaques on stonework facia. It is the memorialisation of

surveillance the lifting of its status to a noble plain on par with the tragic losses of

the world war memorials - one might imagine the individual cameras to have names

and ranks, so enshrined is their service.

Figure 4 - N ever in t he field of human securit y was so much seen by so few of so many

This contrasts with other camera notices that are just metres away (Figure 5), on a

transition staircase to another level of the complex. These are more functionally


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assertive it is a security notice; the premises are protected, this time it is a

scheme rather than a system, and is controlled by The Sheraton rather than

simply operated and it uses black and yellow transfer on white plastic. The

polyester-blend logo-embossed shirt of the jobbing security guard replaces the smart

uniform of Standard Lifes noble warrior here.

Whilst this emphasis of language and materiality may appear subtle, their effect is

very significant in being part of the private curation of pseudo-public space: one is

encouraged along one path, and deterred or blocked from another; ones gaze

should alight on one set of assets and be averted from another by aesthetic

distraction or, in the case of the external store at The Sheraton (Figure 6), by

physical screening.

Figure 5 T o prot ect and cont rol


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Figure 6 - Looking t he other way

The car park screen at The Sheraton is curious in that it shields a storage and waste

area at the hotels vehicular reception area from its guests, but is overlooked from

above by users of the Conference Square. The message here is very clearly you are

in the wrong place; it is the magician on stage performing to an audience, made the

more uncomfortable by its blatant contempt for the other who has not afforded a

seat in the stalls.

Again, it is part of a curatorial encouragement to see what is intended to be seen,

and skim what is not. The other powerful message here is that of privilege of

ownership we own this place and we will orientate it as we see fit. It is as if the

hotel is playing a game of public access poker its face says welcome, but this area

and its surveillance are its tell the gesture that betrays its hand. Ithas the power

and itsets the codes for itsgain.

Analysis of the photographs and video facilitated a mapping of the ownership of the

study area (Figure 7).


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Figure 7 Map of ow nership of st udy area (Appendix C Ow nership Overlay, for full page)

There is range of private versus public spaces, though with open areas tending to be

pseudo-public space (open but owned privately, and sometimes with access

restrictions). A slim sandwich of truly public green space appears within Shandwick

Place and its Georgian Crescents; and The Water of Leith Walkway, which runs

from Balerno at the base of The Pentlands to Leith Harbour, forms another slither

of public space much of it green.

Rights Justified Telling Tales of the City

It is clear from the respondents that we arewilling to play in pseudo-public

environments and whimsically too. The responses indicate that where faced with

surveillance that does not accord with individuals past or current experience, a tale

is created around its presence. Respondent C (The Commuter) revealed a story-

making capacity about surveillance cameras:

I think I read it in a newspaper dont know whenever it was that there was a

lot of stabbings on Lothian Road and that area had moved down to where the; I

think that had sort of moved down to the bottom of where the Omni pictures is, so

maybe thats why theyve looked at more police there; surveillance.

The framing of the response self-satiates by offering justification for recording for the

purposes of crime prevention and the prosecution of offenders. It tends to suggest that

we may have absorbed this notice-based narrative that accompanies CCTV


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presence. Whats more, this small third-hand generalised anecdote was felt enough

to fully resolve the issue of surveillance, and in the mind of the respondent had been

cemented by attachment to the weight of a media source.

Respondent A (The Overnight Visitor), when questioned about the prolonged

presence of police standing outside a local station, was adept at justification too:

Well theyve got their hi-vis jackets on. I suppose thats if anyone needs them in a

hurry or to be seen by traffic I would probably question what are these guys

doing here on a Sunday morning. Whats why yeah. Ive always felt safe and

comfortable and I know that perhaps the policeman outside the train station

somehow subconsciously enforce that safety.

It can be seen here that linking an enduring feeling of safety in a space to thepresence of surveillance has completed the respondents circle of resolution. There

appears to be some question initially about the necessity for such visibility, quickly

self-resolved by linking to the concept of emergency this also seems to satisfy the

question of their presence on a quiet Sunday morning. Linking street surveillance to

emergency appears to another part of the subterfuge of its proliferation it suggests

that we have no time to consider the consequences: that we must act immediately

because we are in peril. These statements show the tactic to be effective buildthem and they will come (around).

Respondent B (The Resident) whilst seated outside The Dean Gallery has highlighted

the presence of CCTV on poles close by, and initially appears less satisfied than

other respondents:

I didnt notice. Now that youve just pointed it out, I suppose Im slightly

uncomfortable. I think judging; theyre not actually watching us I think Id be less

comfortable if it was pointing to us at the moment, but yeah Im uncomfortable

with cameras being around, because it feels like a bit of an infringement. Its back

to this balance between you know complete freedom and safeguards.

This was the only respondent who attempted to formulate a balance and it is of

particular note that the respondent was a resident of the area, whilst the other two

simply passed through. The latter had implied that CCTV was instrumental in their

freedom, whereas the resident, in contrast, appeared to use the term about CCTVs

absence. Interesting, though, is that there is some degree of forgiveness even in the


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statement of misgiving it is deemed better because the camera was not pointing

towards the respondent. So again, a rationale is quickly formulated for its existence:

these cameras are I presume to do with security of the museum and its contents

the artwork inside it.

It was suggested that the respondent might desire similar levels of security on their

own street:

No because there are limits and Im not comfortable with that the extreme

would be that you have a camera in your house to monitor your behaviour and in

case of criminal or dangerous behaviours, and Im not comfortable with that either...

Its intruding in my personal space.

The respondent here draws a line between surveillance in public and in the home,though with a grey-area in that it appears the residents own (public) street should

have no camera not in my front yard. Something is then suggested of the right to

individuality even amongst the density of the city and its codes: I have a right as an

individual to a certain amount of autonomy, even in a city: and privacy without

interference from The State. This was a strong statement from Respondent B as it

had previously been very difficult to elicit any rights that the individual had thought

they had in the city environment:

I dont have a concept of my rights in the streetscape... I think more in terms of my

responsibility I think more than my right I think thats the truth I dont have a

sense of rights particularly. Its not well constructed if its there. But I do have a

sense of responsibility. Im responsible for keeping myself safe from crazy motorists

or crazy pedestrians or people with umbrellas, or children that are not being looked

after, or people running, or cyclists I think you have to watch out for yourself. So

Im aware its my responsibility to keep an eye out for myself, and to be reasonablyvigilant. Not to the point of being frightened.

Taken in combination, these phrases point to this respondent having a clear sense of

innate or evolved rather than externally imposed responsibilities. Ironically, this

requires evocation of the very significant right to be free to exercise those

responsibilities: In many ways, it illustrates the frustration of someone caught in

Becks Risk Society, with risks beyond their measure and actions taken on high. It also

illustrates where a citizen reaches the edges of their conformance to FoucaultsGovernmentality.


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And yet respondent B mirrors the cognitive-science perspective in simply assuming

that risks are real, and focussing on measures for their mitigation:

I dont know what the evidence is that these cameras make a difference. You

would presume just on grounds of common sense that anyones wanting to damage

or to steal would think twice if they are going to be photographed doing it, but I

dont know whether or not that common sense approach is mirrored in evidence.

There is a similar commentary about the role of the police officer in risk

management within the urban environment:

I dont know what the evidence base is for sticking a police officer on a street if

that reduces crime whether it s worthwhile. It sounds worthwhile; of course that s

not always the same thing

Maybe there are better ways to police which are responsive and which are

protective in the sense of early intervention and trying to reduce crime through

public education and awareness and so on, so maybe you dont get bobbies on the

beat in residential areas anymore.

Of uniformed personnel, the respondent appears to mirror their aversion to CCTV

on residential streets:

I think where theres recorded incidents of threat in the form of crime, then theres

a rationale for having the police officer there [but] someone that is assigned to your

street and would be regularly there, and I dont think we need that. That would not

be a useful way to use the resources.

And yet despite the aversion to close-proximity policing, there is a dissonance here

in that the respondent showed signs of resentment that there had been no sight of

police: They dontpatrol in our street. Well ifthey patrol on our street, Ive never

seenthem! This dissonance may be partially attributable to what was revealed after

interview: that the respondent was gay and felt wary of close contact with the police

for fear of homophobic reactions by them. The Edinburgh Evening News article

Police punished over anti-gay slurs (McEwan, 2009) led to a related headline also

appearing on A-boards and news vendor booths within the study area (Figure 8), and

this may well have contributed to such perceptions.


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This is a vivid example of the power of the news agenda in our perceptions of risk

(Banks, 2005, Sharman, 2010), and how that narrative seeps in to the cityscape and

its users.

Figure 8 - Media narr atives of risk

Nevertheless, it can be seen here that the respondent feels that CCTV and police

officers do not have equivalence, despite their stated rationale being similar. The

respondents differentiator here is permanence that a CCTV camera is an enduring

manifestation by its fixed infrastructure. This resident does not want that abiding


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presence either in the form of CCTV or a police officer based near to their

residence. On the other hand, a transient role is seen for a mobile police officer in

the face of imminent risk indicated by previous incidents of threat. This emphasises

one of the resonant attributes of most urban signs of risk they have a sense of

being embedded within their environment of permanence. Examination of the

quantitative data about the state of repair of risk-related street assets from

Queensferry Street demonstrates this, as assets tend to show wear and tear, or be

poor, faded or messy.

Figure 9 - St ate of r epair favours worn, faded or m essy

This demonstrate that most assets have been in place a long time, and any additions

are likely to be expected to have an equal life-span they are, in urban terms,

permanent features of the cityscape, and so we should be reasonably certain that

they have value and are wanted by the citizens.

Surveillants Seen and Not Heard From

Within the West End, mobile surveillance is through a number of area based high-

visibility personnel. This includes police officers and traffic wardens (under the

Decrepit orVery Poor

Signs ofTampering

Poor or Faded orMessy

Wear & Tear

Good

HighlyMaintained

Good or HighlyMaintained


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auspices of Lothian & Borders Police), environmental wardens, parking attendants,

and community safety officers (working for City of Edinburgh Council). Their

external semiotic combines that of the watchful CCTV camera and the yellows, reds,

blacks and fluorescence of its warning notices, but transcended through humanity.

The inference here is that there is an ability to interact meaningfully with this sign of

risk. It was this interactive, discerning humanity that the study wished to probe

through approaches to both Lothian & Borders Police to interview their West End

community beat officer, and to City of Edinburgh Council to interview patrol-based

environmental wardens and community safety officers.

The eligibility requirements for Special Constables (volunteer officers) recognises

explicitly the power that a police officer has within a place of public interest:

Certain occupations or posts prevent a person from joining or retaining the

post of Special Constable. This includes any person, or member of that

persons family who holds or has any financial interest in any certificate,

licence or permit granted in pursuance of the laws relating to regulating

places of public interest. (Lothian & Borders Police, 2010)

A place of public interest is a wide term, and we have seen earlier that there are

many pseudo-public private places where certain controlling activities make themvery much of public interest. Regardless of precise definition, it serves to illustrate

that the police service itself recognises the power of a police officer in a space, and

its potential conflict with other activities happening there.

Though there was dialogue with the West End community beat officer by email and

by phone, and engagement about the nature of the study (to forward through the

chain of command), ultimately it resulted in an email that simply stated Sorry for

taking so long to get back to you. Unfortunately I will be unable to give an interviewto you for your study. This was brusquer than previous correspondence, seeming

perhaps to now be an emphatic organisational voice. There had appeared to be

more probing around the study wishing to engage on a humanistic level rather than

talk about police policy, and this had certainly appeared to be an early concern of the

police officer was opinion allowed? It appears not, and this is the more

unfortunate because the officer is also one of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and

Transgender liaison officers, and could have contributed too about comments made

by the gay resident of the beat area who had feared homophobia from the police.


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Figure 10 Environm ent al warden censorship salute

The study had been unaware of active environmental wardens until happening across

a couple patrolling in a residential part of the study area.

Figure 11 Inst ances of colours of risk Queensferr y St . - each mor e t han tot al of all others

0102030405060708090

100

White Black Grey, Silver orChrome Yellow Red Blue


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Their uniformed aesthetic was particularly striking (Figure 10) using all but one (blue)

of the very dominant colours of risk assets in the urban environment, as quantified

on Queensferry Street (Figure 11) and reflected elsewhere.

Given the lack of subtlety of signalling of environmental wardens, it is curious that

one should make a very clear political gesture to camera to turn the back of a head

around to instead face the camera in order then to put up a hand in front of the

revealed face, and so obscuring it. This gesture is very familiar to the media-scrum

environment within TV news coverage, often there accompanied by the phrase no

comment. So the meaning appears to be one of censoring and importantly,

robustly indicating that censorship of both the camera and the subject. It also has

overtones of that filmic cop-drama phrase theres nothing to see here, which

simultaneously locates activity but forbids the voyeur from vicarious stimulation. In

this instance, that nothing to see here emerged at the other side of the road

crossing to be a plastic bin bag containing waste. It was searched, and declared

through application of a sticker to be safe for collection: THIS REFUSE HAS BEEN

CHECKED FOR ILLEGAL PRESENTATION.

Figure 12 - T he scourge of illegal present ation


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City of Edinburgh Council was approached about a formal interview with the

environmental wardens, since there had been from them a reluctance to provide a

view without proper authorisation. Eventually, the response from the Council was

that: Environmental Wardens wear stab vests and as a result can only patrol with

persons who also wear stab vests and have been through a Personal Safety Training

Course. That stab vests were worn was illuminating, in that the encounter with the

wardens had felt strained and as though the researcher had strayed on a combative

culture. In talking to the wardens informally, there was a great emphasis on their

right to not be photographed. There was some irony, in that as City of Edinburgh

Council workers, one revealed her previous role as a CCTV operator: recording

images of others.

An interview was scheduled some time in advance for a walking interview with a lead

figure of the Community Safety Officers, as it had been established that they did not

have the barrier of wearing stab vests. A lead figure had not been requested, but

provided on the grounds that they knew procedures and codes best. It was pointed

out that the study was more interested in the feelings and thoughts of the officers,

rather than their practical knowledge, and with very short notice of less than an

hour, the interview was postponed by the interviewee who then did not respond to

further approach.

Taken collectively then, these responses and ultimately failure to interview any of

the numerous figures involved in urban protection and safety are indicative of an

unwillingness to expose the surveillants of our urban environments themselves to

reflective surveillance and scrutiny. It may be that the police feel there is enough

scrutiny already from TVs numerous factual cop shows, with their on-message

narration. In these programmes, focus and ridicule are placed on the stupidity of

non-conformists; and so the conform message is re-emphasised.

Ultimately, this unwillingness to engage is self-defeating. If risks are over-hyped in

order to justify increased surveillance, the task of maintaining the hype becomes

more difficult, and so the shock period of each atrocity or disaster must be

deepened or extended to emphasise risks as further supporting evidence (Kunze,

2008, Bannister and Fyfe, 2001). The world must be made to feel riskier in order to

justify the safety measures. It is ultimately unsustainable a pyramid selling of risk,


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which might be revealed to have little substance, dependent upon belief alone. It is a

flourishing faith Risk.

Ghost Writings The Invisibility of Signs

The signage of the risk professionals is emphasised by their mobility colour and

movement. The embedded feeling of static signs, as illustrated earlier, is partly

attributable to their state of repair their condition matches their environment. But

it does no fully explain why they are quite so invisible to respondents. Respondent A

hints at why the signs of the urban environment, associated with task-orientation and

business, may have particular challenges:

I havent really noticed because weve been blethering if I was on my own Id

probably need to notice a bit more, but if Im in mid-conversation with somebody or

walking with somebody I might pay less attention.

There is a suggestion here that the respondent is unable to remember any sign

passed on the interview walk because of engagement in another activity even just

talking.

The unacceptable becomes acceptable after a while. If it sits there long enough,

peoplell just get used to seeing it, and not really question it. Theyre not thinking

about theyre not focussed all the time on road signs and bollards and things.

Their minds are on other things.

The term unacceptable indicates that once aware, the respondent does find the

immediate signscape undesirable. When asked to describe them though, the

respondent identifies them well, so the issue is not one of recognition:

Theres no entry signs; theres directions for traffic; one way system; give way signs;

street signs; parking; prohibited parking or you know, hours for parking during theweek and at weekends. So theres a lot of signs.

The descriptions concord with a rationale for non-absorption shared amongst the

pedestrian respondents, about the intended audience of the signs Respondent C:

For drivers I think [ as] pedestrians you get [ from] A to B as quickly as possible.

You can cut corners; take a couple of risks I suppose; take advantage of traffic;

youre not restricted.


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This has evolved to explain not only that drivers are seen as target of the signs, but

also that this makes walking all the more desirable in the city that signs slowing

traffic would also permit pedestrians to cross ad-hoc between the slower vehicles,

rather than at authorised locations. So this introduces too the notion of freedom of

movement for the pedestrian the opinion that they should be permitted to take a

couple of risks, to cut corners be not be restricted.

Respondent B also takes up themes of containment of pedestrians with a contrary

view about a kerbside barrier forcing division of vehicles and pedestrians.

I can see the point of the barriers as were at a very sharp bend where you cant

see the traffic, and its a reasonable broad road The point is they dont want

people to cross the road here because theyre not able to ascertain the risk of

getting knocked down. Well my assessment is that it wouldnt be safe for me to

cross, and maybe people who are less aware, and maybe children for instance,

wouldnt be able to make that judgement call and might try to cross and get

knocked down.

The respondent uses the framing device of more vulnerable members of society to

cement their argument. This is anecdotally often used to justify provision of risk-

management measures like barriers or kerbs in the city (Dales, 1997-2010). Of

course, the safeguards for vulnerable members of society is important, but it is

important that we respond proportionately and not solely at a lowest common

denominator.

Respondent B, like the others, has also blanked many of the signs of the city, and

fetches up the aspect of over-scale road signs in the pedestrian environment:

I blank a lot of them out, but when you draw my attention to them I guess a lot

of them arent [attractive]. In the West End, theres a big sign that you kind of

walk under it on Queensferry Street, and its really for the size of the pavement

its a massive signI think its a traffic, its a direction sign and so I suppose it

has to be a certain size so you can get the names in big enough print for people to

read. But it should be better on a motorway than an urban pavement.


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Figure 13 - Oversized and overhead

So invisibility is linked to the necessity of creating blind spots to overcome

unattractive large-scale intrusions into the cityscape. These insights combine to

illuminate why pedestrians users of the city do not generally, in everyday life, object

to the intrusions of multiple road signs: they are distracted by task or company, they

see the signs as irrelevant to themselves, and they can be so intrusive and

unattractive that blanking becomes a protective mechanism: the signs become

absent by their conspicuousness.

This nature of signage within a cityscape is inferred to us in A Pattern Language.

Each pattern describes a problem which occurs over and over again in our

environment, and then describes the core solution to that problem, in such a

way that you can use this solution a million times over, without ever doing it

the same way twice. (Alexander et al., 1978)

Provision of signage, a classic problem that in its solution adopts iconography and

colour themes a million times over could be expected to be amongst the two

hundred and fifty three patterns that form the language claimed capable of improving

your town or neighbourhood, but is specifically absent. This indicates signages high-profile invisibility. Though it is not unique in its blending into the background, other

aspects of the city which are customary skimmed-over by casual usersareexamined

by Alexander in detail.

Power Switch

The dissonances of the signscape cause Respondent B to reflect on the decision-

making process in provision of risk assets in the city: Its very in your face, so you


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wonder whether these decisions are made with appropriate consultation. There is

further reflection even about the rationale for the barrier defended earlier:

Ive no idea whether the barrier at the corner where you cant see the traffic

coming actually does make a difference or not. It would be interesting to know

whether they did some assessment or study of that before they put the barrier up,

or whether they did it on grounds of common sense or of a policy on crossing the

road at corners.

The respondent here uses the term of disempowerment they a lot, and further

probes whether the barrier could be more aesthetically attractive:

Were still at the gallery and Im just looking at the rail down the stairs onto the

lawn, and its not that different in terms of its dimensions from the barrier welooked at onto the street, but it s much more aesthetically attractive. The poles, the

struts that support the poles are fashioned in an attractive way and the handrail is

curved at the end, which gives it a sense of being finished.

Significantly, the rail used as a favourable comparison is in a private pseudo-public

space at The Dean Gallery, rather than on the street, and the respondent hits upon

the utilitarian nature of many of the risk-management measures on the street versus

a very similar kind of measure on private property (Figure 14).

Figure 14 - Private (pseudo-public) Public

So we see how even aesthetic attraction is seen as a measure of the power relations

in a place more ornate items perhaps tending to signal that something is privately

owned. And yet, the quantitative analysis of Queensferry Street (Appendix E

Queensferry Street: Coding Top Keywords) when cross-referenced to all its

images coded as Embellishments beyond Form or Historical or Ornate shows the


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balance in the West End of Edinburgh to be split evenly between private and public

ownership. For instance, there were ornate public street lamps, brass plaques,

statues, post boxes, and even some embellished bollards and litterbins. This may be

attributable to the historic associations of Edinburgh, and the consequent designation

of this street as within a conservation zone and UNESCO World Heritage site,

albeit a functional vehicular traffic thoroughfare.

When asked further about whom should make decisions regarding urban aesthetic

matters, the respondent elaborates:

Well, youd like to think itd be experts in aesthetics who had surveyed the

local population in someway and that there was some consistency around these

kind of things Consultat ion should be part of the process, but people who have

studied whats attractive, whats useful, the boundary between functionality and art,

if you like: aesthetics. Who know a lot more about it than the most of us.

So we return to the power within expert knowledges of Beck, Giddens and Foucault

but this time for those with a different knowledge, not about risks in their own

right, but about the boundary between functionality and art. It might even be

thought that the respondent is calling for designers to have a role in the provision of

risk-management assets, rather than simply road engineers. What is clear is thatthere is a call for an interdisciplinary approach to the design of the urban

environment, including its road signs and barriers and one that engages the local

population to be part of the iterations of change.

The call for consistency relates to the topic of order ability to interpret an

environment by consistent cues respondent B relates, I like order up to a

point. Theres a nice blend of order and not exactly disorder but more nature.

But it emerges from respondents also to be a call for order of behaviours byparticipants in the city Respondent A says, I would want to conform. And keep

things running smoothly. Ive no reason not to going on to suggest there is a strong

moral obligation: Yes definitely. I would prefer to do the right thing each time.

Foucaults Governmentality is featuring again here signs are largely inanimate and

can conform to a schema people, though, must submit to behaviour patterns and

the consequences of not behaving. There is implication in respondent As answer

that others who do not conform will hamper things running smoothly and byextension will notbe doing the right thing. Respondent B has similar willingness to


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follow the guidance: to have this balance between traffic and pedestrians as

comfortable as possible Im usually very happy to follow the guidance of the

lights and so on.

This posed the question of what was felt about people who did wish to be part of

this moral order, and respondent C gives an indication about their classification

when asked about feelings of current risks whilst standing in the middle of the traffic

island outside Haymarket Station:

OK. No problems Only time I probably have any acknowledgement with

anybody would be at the corner here where you see a Big Issue seller. And he

always asks you if you want to buy one. So just nod and thatd be it I just dont

want to. Sort of know what its going to be used for as well. I dont think its going

to be used for homelessness. I think itd going to be used for drink and drugs so.

We see a return to story-telling here: the classic signs of a fable with its moral and

big bad wolf attempting to disguise itself as sweet old granny. This hits on the

pollutant of the other (Douglas, 1978) and blame (Douglas, 1994) that

identification of others (those that threaten our boundaries our collective skin) is

important in maintaining a generalised sense of hygiene or cleanliness. And by

blaming used for drink and drugs ourexclusionary actions towards the othercan be justified as theirfault. This sticking plaster protects us from their infection.

The same respondent reiterates the unquantifiable danger of the other: Sometimes

you see a couple of homeless people Im not saying homeless people are thingy,

but sometimes they; they; you know

Respondent A gives a sense of what might contribute to the non-conforming

deviation, and what it represents:

People just not taking care of the environment in which they live. There appears to

be literally no respect for the environment and I guess its because theyre passing

through it; it doesnt belong to them, you know. They can leave their rubbish behind

and forget about it, you know; someone else can deal with it its important to me

to keep the environment and put rubbish in my pockets and to take

responsibility.

So we return to the concept of ownership again but this time the implication is not

literal ownership of a place, but feelingownership of it: if this is not my place, then its


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condition is not my issue. Also returning here is the

map of woe - urban semiotics of risk

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