Is your local area safe?
Tuesday 4 April 2006
You can't open up a newspaper or watch TV without hearing about crimes happening in your local area.
As press reports of anti-social behaviour increase, n2k asked our readers whether they felt safe in their local area. Is crime something you have to face or is it a problem that's not even on your radar?
Taking care
The biggest proportion of those of you who answered reckoned that on the whole things were OK, but you had to be careful at night. Just over a third of you said that things weren't as great as they could be.
Oliver, 17, lives in Yorkshire. "By day, my area is pretty normal," he tells us. "In the evening, though, there are a few people who hang around or come here from other areas looking for trouble.
I think that there can be a few burglaries by people who don't live around here."
Stacey, 15, doesn't feel threatened when she's out and about. "It's not too bad, as long as you stay out of areas where it's a bit dodgy."
Watch yourself
A quarter of you reckoned you had to watch your back when you were hanging around where you live.
Robert, 16, is from an area of London and he says he'd love to live somewhere else. "You get sick of it round here sometimes," he explains.
"There are a few people in the community trying to sort out the graffiti and stuff, but I try not to go out at night and if I do, I make sure I'm with others."
Danger zone
A further 20 per cent of you reckon that things are even worse, answering that you don't feel at all safe in your neighbourhood.
Michael is 14 and says he hardly ever goes out. "There's just gangs of people everywhere, breaking stuff and shouting at people who walk past," he says.
"My sister's too freaked to leave the house and we usually don't head out unless we're on our way to school and back."
Sarah, 15, can sympathise with Michael. "If they're not beating somebody up, they're buying drugs," she tells us. "It doesn't matter what time of day or night it is, they're out there all the time.
My mum's given up shouting at them to stop now; it doesn't make any difference."
Super safe
It seems that some of you have got no worries on the home front, with 20 per cent of you telling us that you feel totally safe and could walk anywhere at any time of day or night.
Alicia, 19, is from Wales and tells us: "Sure there are rough bits in the town where I live, but you just avoid them. My really local area is really lovely; everybody knows everyone and looks out for each other."
Matt is 16 and has a similar experience in the small village where he lives. "I feel totally safe here. Most people in the village have been here since I was little and there's hardly any crime.
People have got more respect for each other than to wreck other people's stuff or steal from them."
Over to you
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