Most students feel at least fairly safe on campus, but would like to see security boosted in certain locations, according to the results of the third annual Safety and Security Survey.

Partial results of this year’s survey, which were released by the Student Safety Advisory Board to THE HOYA this week, showed that 91.8 percent of survey respondents – comprised of more than 1,700 undergraduate and graduate students – feel that the campus is “fairly safe” or “extremely safe,” up from 85.3 percent in the previous year’s survey. At the same time, many students said they were concerned about several fights and assaults that took place on campus last year, especially on the northern side of campus.

In the survey, students expressed concerns about the safety in the areas around St. Mary’s Hall, where an altercation took place last November that resulted in the arrest of two Georgetown students. Students were also concerned about security near the base of the steps of Lauinger Library as a result of multiple muggings that took place there last year, as well as in Burleith and West Georgetown.

In response, the university has replaced bulbs, repaired light fixtures and routinely surveys campus lighting. Additionally, the Office of Campus Safety cut away excess landscaping with the help of the National Park Service to create more light at the corner of 36th and Prospect Streets.

The university has also installed a new type of camera called an “Intelligent Camera,” which is pre-programmed to recognize specific dangerous types of activity in certain areas; for example, if someone was trying to hide in the dark near the Lauinger Library steps, the camera would pick up the activity and alert the Department of Public Safety officer monitoring the videos, Rocco DelMonaco, vice president of university safety, said.

“The cameras are a force multiplier by taking the manpower we have already and spreading that over the campus,” DelMonaco said.

Officers of the Department of Public Safety have had their routes changed to address areas that were specified in this year’s survey, DelMonaco said. Officers have also been given new batons and mace as a result of the new contract that they agreed to in March. There are also more full-time trained DPS officers on staff, a result of attempts to improve the high attrition rate last year by increasing wages.

“There is a definite balance between using people and technology to enhance safety,” Peter Luger, director of university safety operations, said. “We want to be able to use a combination of both as much as possible. We have a group of people looking into new technology such as public-address systems.”

As a number of students taking the survey requested that improvements be made to late night transportation system, the SafeRides shuttles have been made more frequent and more vans have been added to the circuit and more stops.

“We are looking to build on many of the new policies and services the university implemented over the summer,” DelMonaco said.

Various types of emergency notification systems have been implemented in recent months, both on the individual and the campus-wide levels. Students have been encouraged to register for the Emergency Notification System which will send text and e-mail messages in the case of an emergency situation. Three campus alert system steam whistles have also been installed on campus.

“It’s all about having as many methods of communication as possible,” Luger said. “We can use all of them at any time since we never know which system will be down – phone, internet or any other medium. Expanding the number of whistles on campus helped us cover the entire campus and putting in the ENS gave us multiple more ways to communicate emergencies to students.”