Exploring the impact of ambient population measures on London crime hotspots

The research identifies the Census workday population as the most appropriate population-at-risk measure. It also highlights areas that exhibit statistically significant rates using both the ambient and residential denominators. This hints at an environmental backcloth that is indicative of both crime generators and attractors - i.e. places that attract large numbers of people for non-crime purposes (generators) as well as places that are used specifically for criminal activity (attractors). Regions that are largely residential and yet only exhibit hotspots under the ambient population might be places with a higher proportion of crime attractors to stimulate crime, but fewer generators to attract volumes of people.