Risk Assessment Methodology: Key Principles of External Building Security

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Abstract

External building security is a critical part in the building design process in order to construct a building that provide conducive social, intellectual, creative, and physical activities of its shareholders. There are numerous key principles of external building security with ability to withstand various attack types. This paper lists, describes and assesses these principles.

Security is a fundamental part of the building design process and should be considered as an issue that provide clear guidance regarding the design, methods and materials of building that enhance effective, acceptable and affordable security to all building stakeholders. Planning of a building should be conducive to all intellectual, physical, social, and creative activities of the stakeholders. Buildings should be secure enough to provide lively as well as welcoming operational environment that does not over-power, impersonate or institute personal hazards while accommodating range of activities.

External building security, right from the preliminary stage to final building construction, focuses on the built environment, threatened internally and externally by vandalism that includes graffiti and glass breakage, theft, arson, and burglary. It addresses actions taken to protect buildings, property and assets against intruders.

According to Cooper and DeGrazio (1995), building security is neither installation of the latest software package as well as electronic gear nor a consideration of building types that have high specific considerations of occupancy, but it is increasingly buildings of all kinds that cater for careful security planning, proceeding hand-in-hand with design process of architecture. It is therefore, important to acquaint architects with a variety of security factors in order to ensure appropriate and cost-effective building security.

Building external security require security systems and their designs although this depends on the location, type of the building, and what require to be secured. Current trends indicate that buildings of all shapes and kinds are subject to security planning which must be involved in architectural process. Therefore, what security system is designed to protect should be considered bearing in mind that security is not just about the people inside the organization, but also about the building contents.

There are number of principles of external building security that influence building security. They include building access, structural elements and materials, building configuration, roof design, electronic security systems, monitoring, lighting, perimeter controls, security guards, and pedestrian traffic and access control among other key principles.

Building access points

Areas surrounding a building and its access points are equally as important as the building itself. As indicated by Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (2004), building access points should be as minimal as possible but meet fire hazard regulations and all operational requirements of a particular building.

With minimum building access points, all visitors are screened from main entrance points thus decreasing intrusion capabilities. In addition, building access points should be strategically positioned at places where view from office area, audio connections or remote electronics locks are unrestricted. This will facilitate easy identification of intruders.

Structural elements and materials

Materials that are vulnerable to breakage or can easily be damaged should be avoided. For example, slate and tiles should be avoided on vertical facades and vandal- proof glass used instead. Many buildings adopt wide glazing panels because they look attractive especially when structured on the first floor. However, they become the most appealing target points of stone throwers and intruders. Once damaged, intrusion becomes easy. Therefore, smaller and easily replaceable glazed units should be considered on areas where intrusion is likely to occur easily. In addition, structural fire containment of a material must be considered in order to reduce fire damages. Moreover, fire can start in different building compartments, therefore, buildings must possess rooms with minimal disruptions.

Lighting

Lighting is very crucial for any organization regarding security concerns and procedures because it serves as an excellent psychological and physical intrusion deterrent. According to Essex Police (2012), good lighting is important but requires proper positioning. This is because well positioned and situated lights can assist to deter intruders, thus creating safe environment. However, wrongly positioned and situated lights become a helping hand to intruders. There are different kinds of lightings that are used, and they include fluorescent, high and low-pressure sodium, mercury vapor, and incandescent among others. These lighting types suit different needs but the most crucial point to remember is that light is meant to discourage intruders. In lighting positioning and fitting, factors such as color rendering, focusing capability, flicker rate, restart time and lumens per watt should be considered. For instance, lightings that distort colors, have poor focusing capability and flickering rate is high, cannot be used in conjunction with Closed Circuit Televisions (CCTV) because this can affect the overall picture of a possible suspect and distort the evidence. In addition, flickering and dull lights can encourage intrusions because intruders cannot be identified easily. It is, therefore, important that high efficiency, long life, and effective to the situation lamps be incorporated. This will allow a correlation between illumination, intensity and time taken to detect an intruder.

Building configuration and roof design

A rectangular building without recesses and alcoves is considered most secure (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2004). Recessed doors and alcoves create vulnerable and covered areas through which intruders gain access into the building because these configurations present good climbing opportunities. Avoiding such areas in the design enhances security. Roof design on the other hand, can encourage or deter intruders. Certainly, roofs that are constructed with narrow and short eaves become intruders’ helping hands. However, access to roof can be prevented and deter intrusion if a roof with deep overhanging eaves is constructed.

Perimeter control

Effective boundary is a critical building security that relieves pressures from other vulnerable areas. Perimeter control comprises of fences, gates and walls that keep intruders and trespassers away from a building. Fences provide crowd control and deter intruders although cost, appearance, structure, and inability to stop a determined intruder form most of their drawbacks. Gates also, preset or programmable, stop intruders through man trapping. Although it is generally difficult to elect an impenetrable, acceptable, affordable, and appropriate perimeter, it should be appropriately defined to prevent careless intrusion and make intentional intrusion difficult and noticeable. Gate locks should be placed in places that are hard to identify in order to prevent vandalism. In addition, they should not impede visual observation of the building (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2004).

Electronic security systems and monitoring

Security systems that include intruder and fire alarms, Closed Circuit Televisions (CCTV), electric door locks, and security lighting among others, act as intrusion deterrent, since they detect presence of intruders, and help in their identification and prosecution. These devices usually incorporate external sounders. Their installation, therefore, should be monitored by external alarm Response Company for them to be effective.

Security guards

Security guards hold a critical role in ensuring external building security. They make some crucial decisions that cannot be made by automated systems and computers. They are essentially effective when maintaining order, crowd control, evacuation procedures and most of issues dealing with security concerns. Since they cannot be everywhere all the time, CCTV is used to argument security. However, training, cost, policy, and complacency tend to neglect security guards. It is important then that security guards get complacent and recurrent training. Their understanding and policy execution should be followed to the letter and complacent factor eliminated. This will enhance intrusion deterrent.

Pedestrian traffic and access control

There are different access control types such as chip-readers, card readers and electronic locks that read keys, disks or cards controlled by stakeholders of the building. Most of these systems require insertion or swiping of cards that usually contain magnetic strips or proximity readers. These cards are used in conjunction with devices that allow entry in the building. Certainly, intruders can make their way into a building where proper maintenance and test are not run correctly. Thus, proper functioning systems will eliminate security breech from any un-invited guest. Other sophiscated systems such as fingerprint readers, voice recognizers and retinal pattern readers can prevent pedestrian traffic and deter any intrusion.

Conclusion

External building security plays a major role in protecting organizations and businesses. Since security should be enforced from the outset but not as a reaction to security threat occurrence, external crime reduction will facilitate internal security, which will result to overall security. It is therefore, crucial to balance many variables in order to ensure sufficient security. By taking security considerations seriously, rights from the word go and maintaining its awareness in every stage, buildings will be adequately protected and threats will be resolved before they escalate to theft, harm or disruption of services.

References

Cooper, W. & DeGrazio, R., (1995). Building Security: An Architect’s Guide. Retrieved from:

http://www.cryptome.org/archsec.htm

Essex Police, (2012). Building Security. Retrieved from:

http://www.essex.police.uk/be_safe/business_crime/building_security.aspx

Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, (2004). School Safety and Security:

Lessons in Danger. OECD Publishing.