The significance of local affordable housing projects for the perception of spatial safety – lessons from Farsta Strand

Project name: The significance of local affordable housing projects for the perception of spatial safety – lessons from Farsta Strand
Project manager:  Ingalill Söderberg , FoB, Real Estate Business & Financial Systems
Other participants in the project from KTH: Annina Persson och Linda Lövgren
Participating universities/companies/other organisations: Lunds universitet, Stockholms Stadsmission
Financing: Formas 2026-00166
Project period: 20260901 - 20290831

This project develops new practice-oriented knowledge about how management forms and organized collaboration can increase safety in the built environment. Farsta Strand in Stockholm serves as case study – an area transformed from a classified open drug scene and violent incidents to increased perceived safety. The project analyzes whether and how Stockholm City Mission's housing project with relational management and a cooperative rental housing association can catalyze safety in the surrounding area. Through design-based research, a model for cross-sectoral collaboration is developed together with district administration, police, property owners and residents.
The project combines three perspectives: legal analysis of management forms and collaboration structures, risk psychology understanding of safety perceptions in heterogeneous groups, and urban planning expertise on social housing development. Expected results include evidence on relational management's effects at neighborhood level, the first systematic study of cooperative rental housing as a safety factor, and a scalable model for area collaboration based on generalizable design principles. The project directly addresses the knowledge needs identified in the governmental inquiry on area collaboration (SOU 2025:5) and contributes to developing inclusive safety-creating methods as alternatives to control-oriented strategies.

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