I sincerely wonder what mechanism makes planting trees reduce crime more effectively than increased policing. If true, that lends credence to Broken Windows Theory, no?
The main problem I have with Broken Windows Theory is that rather than being used to improve the environments (fixing the broken windows) it's often used to justify flooding the streets with police and aggressively harassing people. It identifies the source of the problem (the run down areas of a city), but then ignores it because overaggressive policing is an easier sell than spending that money improving the living environments of "the wrong kinds of people". Making those spaces into more oppressive environments won't tend to do much to solve the crime problem because it was an oppressive environment that caused the problem in the first place.
Cleaning up and maintaining the run down areas communicates to everyone that the area and the people living in it have value. People start to expect more from the area and from each other. It also makes those spaces less attractive to people looking to cause trouble and more attractive to businesses and to people from outside of that community. The health and mental well-being of the community improves and so does their economy. Shooting jaywalkers and setting up stop and frisk checkpoints just makes everyone feel like criminals and sure enough that's what you get.
Broken Windows Theory isn't wrong, but Broken Windows Policing is a problem because what these areas need aren't just police, but rather urban developers, landscapers, and construction crews. Cities that clean up, improve, and maintain the run down parts of town see crime drop. Cities that simply use run down areas to designate "problem populations" and send in the police harass those communities over every possible minor infraction don't get those kinds of results.
True, stop and frisk is just one of many ways broken windows policing can aggressively target the people, when what's actually needed is to target the environment. Policing has a role in cleaning up run down areas, but it's a small one compared to the infrastructure, urban planning, and landscaping improvements needed to reduce crime. Too much/aggressive policing is just another broken window that needs fixing. It signifies that the area is a bad part of town and sets that area apart from the nicer parts of the city.
