E. Coppola, C. Mastrorilli (2025), “Safe green spaces: promoting urban vitality through park safety”, in I. Fasolino, M. Grimaldi, E. Coppola, M. Russo (Editors) in Valori e Valutazioni, n. 38, ISSN 2036-2404, pp. 21-38 (https://doi.org/10.48264/VVSIEV-20253803)

This contribution is part of the PRIN PNRR 2022 research project “SeTUP – Security Town through Urban Planning”, which explores the relationship between safety and urban green spaces, with the aim of developing a riskmapping model based on environmental quality indicators to support the assessment of safety in urban parks. The ultimate goal is to construct a spatial decision support system to inform future urban planning strategies and to define guidelines for urban green space within planning instruments. The research unit of the Department of Architecture at the University of Naples Federico II has focused its analysis on green areas in the Municipality of Naples and their surrounding contexts, adopting the 15-minute walkability scale. A perceptual approach to safety was employed to investigate the interactions between perceived environmental characteristics and users’ well-being. The study draws inspiration from, and contemporises, the work of American anthropologist Jane Jacobs, who revolutionised the concept of urban safety in 1961, as well as the later contributions of Oscar Newman, which led to the development of CPTED (Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design). This contribution engages with contemporary theories on place vitality, offering new reflections on the potential of urban planning to prevent perceptions of insecurity while promoting collective well-being and social cohesion. The paper specifically presents the application of the proposed model through a comparative analysis of three case studies located in vibrant and diverse neighbourhoods of the city.