disciplinary architecture

I've been trying to convince the city administration to install a short iron railing on top of the streetscape planters to discourage sitting, an idea that has been brought up in the past and rejected because of cost. In researching other, cheaper ways to discourage sitters I've discovered that there's a name for this type of architecture; defensive architecture if you're seeing it in a positive light ,or disciplinary architecture if your point of view is somewhat more negative about the concept. The city of Tokyo has taken this to the extreme of creating park benches that are unsittable for any extended length of time, and strategically designed "art" that takes over public spaces previously occupied by homeless.
I'm not about to apologize for advocating some reasonable measures in the case of these planters. They were installed as part of a failed effort in the 1980s to try to make the downtown look like the shopping malls that had drawn business to the suburbs. Their failure was compounded by the lost on-street parking spaces and the damage created to the downtown pedestrian-friendliness by the large parking lot separating the square from the North Main area and the even more ill-concieved parking garage (now gone). The "streetscape" was paid for by assessments on property owners. It failed miserably while preservation of old buildings north of Fourth Street has succeeded, beyond the streetscape's boundaries, yet the city administration resists any removal or modification. Businesses within the Central Park Historic District manage to cope "in spite of" the streetscape and the lost "look and feel" of a traditional downtown (which shopping areas like Easton Center in Columbus try to emulate). Here on the west side of the Square, the negative impact of the streetscape is most intense with lost parking, lost loading and unloading access, and lost traditional cityscape.
The smoker/idlers can remain standing as far as I'm concerned or walk across the street to the park where there are real benches and grass to sit on. If the planters can't be removed, at least they shouldn't serve a function that drives business away.