Cities throughout the United States—and in Europe and Japan—are installing park benches, coverings over subway heat gratings, etc., that are deliberately called “hostile architecture,” in order to prevent the surge of millions of homeless from having a safe place to sleep.
There is a real issue that cities do not want to have homeless persons sleeping on the streets near subways or in parks, requiring citizens to have to step over them. But, rather than creating productive jobs, affordable and accessible housing, and mental health treatment facilities for those who need them, which would require a fundamental upgrade of society and the physical economy, state and city governments instead are spending untold sums for architecture to physically repulse the poor and homeless, blockading them out of cities.
In the 1960s, hostile architecture—sometimes called defensive architecture—started to be built; but in the 21st century it has relentlessly spread. Exemplary of hostile architecture are:
Street or doorway spikes: Spikes are built into the concrete pavement of streets or doorways, making it impossible for anyone to lie down to sleep in the street or doorway.
Segmented benches: In which iron ornaments are placed as impediments one-third of the way from the end of the bench, so that no one can sleep on it.
