On the 27th March 2025 Boguslawa Motylska and Richard Stones from CPTED-UK took part in the Safe-Cities Final Demo in Nova Gorica, Slovenia. The Safe Cities is one of the most important EU R&D projects of recent years in the built environment security-by-design. The final demonstration offered a glimpse into the future of safer, smarter cities.
The Safe Cities project was launched to help protect public areas by providing a security and vulnerability assessment framework. This assumption could be achieved by an interactive platform developed to enable the simulation of complex scenarios, taking into account the behaviour of the crowd and various types of threats in any space in a realistic 3D virtual environment, allowing for comprehensive and dynamic risk and vulnerability assessments of the tested locations.
The project was based on full participation and cooperation of public and private entities, including citizens, in developing a strategy to ensure the safety of public spaces while maintaining its open character. It was created and coordinated by governmental and non-governmental institutions as well as technology companies, in close cooperation with executive and law enforcement authorities as well as multi-sectoral stakeholders.
The official demonstration in Slovenia has showcased:
A Security Vulnerability Assessment (SVA) Framework – integrating a participatory model and security-by-design approach to proactively assess risks.
Advanced Software Tools – capable of performing static vulnerability assessments and simulating dynamic threat scenarios using serious gaming methodologies.
Intuitive Dashboards – providing clear, actionable insights for security assessments and decision-making.
Umberto Battista, the project coordinator, highlighted the significance of these innovations:
“SAFE-CITIES tools will assist in assessing the security of public and semi-public spaces, urban areas, and large-scale events. Additionally, solutions will support the design of new public spaces”.