Helsinki changes graffiti policy

Zero-tolerance line replaced by softer approach

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By Antti Tiainen
     
      The amount of graffiti on walls in Helsinki is on the rise again. Just over a year and a half ago, the city abandoned its controversial Stop töhryille (“Stop Tagging” or “Stop the Scrawling”) anti-graffiti project, and its policy of zero tolerance. Last summer, a special wall was set up in Suvilahti where graffiti artists could legally ply their craft. This year the Helsinki Youth Department set up another graffiti wall in the Kalasatama area.
      “While the wall has been in existence, the graffiti have stayed on the wall quite well. When the wall was not there during the winter, graffiti would appear in places where they were not meant to be”, says Matti Waara of Kaapelitalo, which is responsible for maintenance of the buildings in Suvilahti.
     
The surrounding area has not turned into a concentration of illicit graffiti. According to the head of the project, Kauko Haantie, the greatest amount of graffiti appears, as before, in the Kannelmäki and Malminkartano neighbourhoods.
      Haantie estimates that graffiti has doubled since the end of the Stop töhryille project. At that time, there were an estimated 6,000.
      “The increase has been greatest on Metro trains and trams”, Haantie says. However, he does not believe that the problem will continue to grow. “As long as the police make efforts in the matter. Then there will be a balance of terror.”
     
Police in Helsinki have had their own graffiti working group already before the Stop töhryille project was set up. The end of the project has not been reflected in any change in its figures.
      However, the group only investigates cases in which a larger number of graffiti are attributed to a single suspect.
      “Not every scribble on an electricity box is investigated, and not every potential plaintiff even files a criminal complaint”, says the group’s main investigator Toni Uuskivi.
     
Giving up the Stop töhryille project has approximately halved the amount of money spent by the city on cleaning up graffiti. Nowadays Helsinki spends about EUR 500,000 on it each year.
      Haantie says that the cost cuts mainly stem from the fact that there is no longer a rush to clean up graffiti as soon as it appears somewhere. The cleanup is made by a subcontractor who has ten people on its payroll in the summer.
      Security companies are also still used, but only about once a month. Their services are called in if there is a constant graffiti problem in a particular neighbourhood or school.
      “Then we consider if it is more sensible than to constantly clean the walls. But in practice, we hardly ever run around pursuing perpetrators”, Haantie say.
      “In field work we have felt that it is necessary to have a place where it is permissible to paint, to avoid constant back-and-forth bickering. Years from now we will see what the final result is. Will there be new habitual scrawlers?”
     
Graffiti is more common on trains. “We are not at the same level that we were ten years ago, but in the past two years the damage has increased, and all indications are that they are increasing all the time”, says VR safety chief Teemu Väänänen.
      “On an annual level we are talking about damage worth several hundred thousand euros.”
      Helsinki and its environs have always been the most problematic for VR.
      “Local transport is a case unto itself.”
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 9.8.2010


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Call for impartial evaluation of effectiveness of Helsinkís “Stop the Scrawling” anti-graffiti campaign (17.9.2008)
  Prison sentences and compensation demands have curbed graffiti in Helsinki (31.3.2006)
  Millions spent on anti-graffiti project (28.1.2009)

ANTTI TIAINEN / Helsingin Sanomat
antti.tiainen@hs.fi