The neighbourhoods and town centres where people are most likely to be mugged, carjacked or threatened and forced to hand over mobile phones have been revealed by a new crime map.
A new interactive crime map has revealed the neighbourhoods in Britain where you’re most likely to be mugged, carjacked or robbed, according to police data.
Last year, police recorded more than 80,000 crimes of robbery in England and Wales. That is any crime where an offender uses force or the threat of force in order to steal. It can include mugging (where someone is attacked and robbed on the street), robbery by intimidation (making someone think violence or force will be used to steal from them), carjacking (using force to steal a vehicle), an armed robbery or a bank robbery.
It is a more serious offence than simple theft and can leave victims suffering psychological harm, even triggering long-term mental health issues such as Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). The maximum sentence is life imprisonment. As with most crime types, robberies are more likely to take place in busy town and city centres than in residential neighbourhoods.
Last year, outside central London – where tourists are far more likely to be targeted than anywhere else – Leeds City Centre witnessed the highest number of robberies with 365, the equivalent of one per day. Next was the North Central & Dartmouth Circus (287) and Central (262) districts of Birmingham city centre.
You can see how crime rates compare near you using our interactive map.
Crime rates – the number of crimes in each area for every 1,000 people living there – allow for a fairer comparison of the likelihood of being robbed in places with widely different population sizes. However, in some busy city centres, the results may be skewed by the number of visitors.
After Leeds City Centre and districts within Birmingham’s city centre, the risk of a robbery was greatest in Central Bradford. There were 133 robberies last year in Central Bradford, a rate of 20 crimes for every 1,000 people, or one robbery for every 50 residents. Next was Bristol’s City Centre & Harbourside neighbourhood (17 robberies per 1,000 residents), Leicester City Centre (16 per 1,000 people), Central Blackpool (14), and Nottingham City Centre & Trent Bridge (14).
However, robbery is far more likely in London than anywhere else in England and Wales. The 32 local authority areas with the highest rates of robbery are all boroughs of London.
Of neighbourhood areas, robberies were most common in Fitzrovia West & Soho, a total of 1,285 last year. That’s the equivalent of a robbery every seven hours, or at least three each day.
Figures are available for every one of more than 7,000 neighbourhoods in England and Wales apart from areas covered by Greater Manchester Police, as the force has not supplied crime data for last year. Crime figures are available for neighbourhoods with between 7,000 and 10,000 residents, which the government designates as Middle Super Output Areas (MSOAs).
The statistics do not include crimes reported at train stations, as British Transport Police record them.