It's location, location, location!

This map showing B&Es adds weight to the claims of a senior LFP editor.

Today, The London Free Press crime reporter Scott Taylor told readers they have a one in 60 chance of being burglarized. Taylor tells us that last year there were 2,900 reported break-and-enters in London, a city with roughly 170,000 households and businesses. A little simple math and Taylor calculated his one in 60 number.

Back when I was still working at the newspaper, I used to give a senior editor at the paper a ride home from work. He lived in the southwest end of the city. One night we chatted about home break-ins. He told me his neighbourhood was very quiet and very safe with very few break-ins. He claimed that crooks were lazy and liked to burglarize homes either near where they themselves lived or near a main road. I gathered he thought crooks were so lazy that they didn't even want to drive too far off the crime beaten path. They like easy access.

If the editor was right, where you live in London will modify your chance of being burglarized. Using info and maps posted by Neighbourhood Watch I looked at Southwest London, the editor's neighbourhood. Then I looked at an area east of the core.

I have to admit that what I found didn't leave me all that surprised. When I worked downtown at the newspaper, the cars of employees parked in the company lots were regularly burglarized. For some years I lived just west of the core and break-ins were not uncommon. My one daughter lives in what is known as EOA, the East of Adelaide neighbourhood. She has had her home broken into as have some of her neighbours.

This is not to say there are no break-in in the southwest. There are. But the your chance of being burglarized in the southwest end of town are not as great as for those living in some other parts of the city. If you live beside a pedestrian walkway joining two streets, I believe your chances of being burglarized go up. As the editor said, crooks are lazy and like easy access. It seems both urban planners and urban burglars like walkways.

Some neighbourhoods and some home locations are definitely more at risk than others. When it comes to the burglary game, the dice are loaded.

During the same period as above, the editor's neighbourhood had no B&Es. None!