1 Safer Leiria – A Collaborative Intervention Method

Urban area, historical city centre, small Town, located half-way between the two main cities of Portugal, Lisbon and Porto.
Several factors had an impact on the perception of security among the citizens of Leiria in the years preceding the project implementation, among them:
Social Factors – the decline in population in the historic centre, and the simultaneous opening of nightlife venues led to an increase in the use of public spaces at night.
Social and Cultural Factors – the rapid increase in the population originating from the Middle East, the Indian Ocean and South America, mainly Brazil, has brought to the city new habits, new religions and new ways to live in the public spaces.
Political Factors – the concern to keep the city as one of the most attractive, and the need to maintain good levels of perception of security in public spaces.
Economic Factors – the increase in housing prices and the simultaneous increase in demand for housing by newly arrived citizens has created a specific need in the real estate market. In addition to the economic crisis, the rapid demand for low-cost housing has created an imbalance, which has sometimes led to the occupation of vacant spaces without habitable conditions and over-occupation issues.
Finally, the lack of an integrated urban planning strategy and of a strategic mobility plan impacted on the perception of security. Nota bene: 2025, these plans presently exist.

Enhance Security and Perception of Safety
Improve sustainable mobility
Improve social inclusion

Leiria has a population of approx. 128.000 inhabitants, of which 5.8% of foreign nationality. While over the course of the years there has been a decrease in general crime, the way the city has been developing has had an impact on the inhabitants’ feelings of insecurity, caused by different reasons (urban voids, vacant buildings or buildings occupied, poor night-time lighting conditions, decline of population in the centre, etc). To address these aspects, the Municipality of Leiria, thanks to the participation in the project UrbSecurity, decided to apply a collaborative and participatory method for realising interventions in the city, involving public authorities and citizens. It was decided to develop an Integrated Action Plan (IAP) that would focus on two main areas of the city. To co-develop it, an Urbact Local Group (ULG) was created, involving residents, schools, security forces, industries and other organisations.

The main pillars of the IAP were:
Implementation of a collaborative process to promote security and safety in public spaces.
Involvement of the population in the identification of problems and intervention in the public environment. The ULG members, were asked to take part in “serious games”, during which participants were invited to discuss, identify problems, and find joint solutions to improve urban security in the city, elaborating proposals for urban planning.
Use of the method CPTED – Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design.
The main pillars of the IAP were:
Implementation of a collaborative process to promote security and safety in public spaces.
Involvement of the population in the identification of problems and intervention in the public environment. The ULG members, were asked to take part in “serious games”, during which participants were invited to discuss, identify problems, and find joint solutions to improve urban security in the city, elaborating proposals for urban planning.
Use of the method CPTED – Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design.

ACILIS – Commerce, Industry, Services and Tourism Leiria Association
IPL -P Polytechnic Institute of Leiria
PSP Leiria – Public Safety Police, District Command
GNR – National Republican Guard, Detachment of Leiria
Portuguese Association of the Disabled – District Delegation of Leiria, IPJ – Portuguese Youth Institute
CIMRL – Intermunicipal Community of the Region of Leiria
ACAPO – Association of the Blind and Visually Impaired of Portugal – Delegation of Leiria
D. Dinis Schools Grouping, Domingos Sequeira Schools Grouping, Nossa Sra. de Fátima School, Marrazes Schools Grouping
Local press newspapers: Diário de Leiria, Region of Leiria and Jornal de Leiria
NERLEI – Leiria Business Association; Union of Parishes of Leiria, Pousos, Barreira e Cortes
Union of Parishes of Marrazes and Barosa
ADLEI – Association for the Development of Leiria
InPulsar – Community Development Association
NEL – Leiria Speleology Center
Colectivo A9)))))
Parish of Leiria
Parish of Marrazes
Evangelical Church
Leiria Mosque
Athletic Club of Sismaria
Volunteer Firefighters from Leiria
Sapadores Firefighters from Leiria
Plastidom/domplex
Casa Iglesias
Atlas Hostel
Interestingly, also representatives of different religions participated. People in vulnerable situations were not directly involved, but rather the social support entities that work with them were asked to join the discussions.

To address the main aspects contributing to the sense of insecurity among inhabitants, a collaborative and participatory approach was employed.
The creation of an Urbact Local Group, composed of different representatives of the society, and their participation in dynamic games, defined as serious games, allowed the city community to discuss, identify problems, and find joint solutions to improve urban security in the city of Leiria.
In Leiria, stakeholders were asked to collaborate and interact through game dynamics that took place during round tables, each one accompanied by a technician from the municipality. Stakeholders were able to engage in discussions and collaboratively develop solutions to enhance urban security in the city of Leiria, focusing on two distinct urban areas: (a) the historical City Centre; and (b) a more recent expansion area, characterized by a high multiculturalism.
This collaborative process took place in different stages:
During the first stage, participants were invited to use storytelling board games and creativity to collaboratively identify problems and solutions. Afterwards, the participants were invited to vote on what could be the main problems.
During the second stage, participants continued to identify problems and solutions, interacting with maps of several sites.
The third stage resulted from the culmination of the two previous stages. At first, participants were asked to locate the main problems that condition the safety of the urban area in question. Then, participants took the role of members of an executive of the municipality, that was responsible to manage a 4-year budget, making investment decisions to improve the urban security of the area.
It was observed that the application of gamification and serious gaming techniques could offer a valuable tool for engaging all stakeholders in participatory urban planning. These methods proved to support the planning processes in a more interactive, effective, and enjoyable way.

Involving diverse stakeholders in roundtable discussions through gamification techniques introduced a new and innovative social practice. While the main goal was to develop a planning-focused game, various games were integrated throughout the entire process. This approach created specific participatory dynamics, as the games not only engaged participants but also contributed to the co-creation of an additional final game, thanks to the collaboration between stakeholders and technical experts.
The development of this method aimed to ensure a balance of power, guaranteeing that everyone had the same opportunity and decision-making power, regardless of their background or role.

No advanced technological tools were employed in the project, apart from the necessary adaptation of serious games and activities from in-person to online formats, due to the constraints imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The most significant result was bringing the issue of urban security to the forefront. The dissemination of this topic in the media and local press was reported by the project partners as having contributed to an improved local perception of security.
The participatory approach has enabled the inclusion of diverse perspectives, and the needs and preferences of different stakeholders were acknowledged. Besides, it facilitated the establishment of partnerships between the various entities involved.
Involving local communities has facilitated the identification of concrete aspects to tackle, with the aim of increasing the sense of security (for example police surveillance, public lighting, the improvement of spaces and public transport, urban regeneration programmes and social programmes).
This process was new to the city and proved to bring good results and a practice that was recognised by the mayor as a good practice to be used in future projects.
The use of the CPTED – Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design led to the draft of a Good Practices Guide on Criminal Prevention and training for municipal technicians on local safety.

It was proven that gaming techniques can support to find collaborative solutions, in a more participatory modality.
The initial challenge was to implement a correct reaction to participants’ passivity, encourage participatory co-creation in groups composed of various actors from different backgrounds, and break the hierarchical rules that naturally arise in meetings involving municipal or police entities.
The methodology applied required significant flexibility and adaptability by the technical team, both in terms of the activities conducted and for the timing of the project.
The key role of communication not only in disseminating the results externally, but above all in serving as a unifying tool for the various teams involved in a project of this scale.
The final lesson that emerged at the end of the project was the importance of securing political commitments to ensure the continuation of projects after their completion, not only for incorporating the lessons learned into the daily operations of organizations, but above all to obtain support for accessing funding for the actions outlined in the action plans developed within the projects.

Part of the project took place during the pandemic: several activities were moved online and the number of participants in the collaborative activities was reduced.
The need to overcome reluctance in participation (e.g., initially, the representatives and some residents of the historic centre expressed that when they were invited to meetings with the municipality, they were relegated to passive roles and felt that, although their opinions were heard and recorded, they had no real impact. Later, they questioned why this method had not been used previously.
Another initial challenge was to overcome the unease and even distrust of some participants, who had been grouped with members of the police force and representatives of other churches.

Some of the actions were framed within other ongoing projects in the city, always incorporating the theme of urban security in its various aspects. The Small-Scale Actions were developed in collaboration with social support entities, which allows for the continued dissemination of the topic of security in schools.
The Project was funded by the URBACT programme, whose budget comes from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) as well as national contributions. In January 2019, the partnership ”Security in Public Spaces“ was established including the members of the “Urban Agenda for the EU” and the partners of the Urbact network (including representatives of the UrbSecurity project).
The project results can be an example to other municipal services to develop their own integrated action plans through an active engagement of citizens.
In particular, Leiria’s team delivered an English version of the game’s instructions to be used by any city that wishes to implement this methodology, available at: https://drive.google.com/drive/u/0/folders/1zKBndkMmkaCM8mYZvmBmqUN7mGuPN7Ex