There are no national data on the extent to which people feel safe or unsafe in 30 km/h zones. In a general sense feeling unsafe seems to occur especially when many road users are speeding. In 30 km/h zones feeling unsafe is also the case if there is much motorized traffic [8]. People also appear to feel less safe when:
- different types of road users need to mix;
- there is a large proportion of heavy traffic; and
- traffic situations are unclear [9] [10].
Residents in many residential areas see speed as a problem and they ask the municipality to take measures (see also the question (How can 30 km/h zones be made (even) safer?. This suggests that road safety is often not experienced as optimal. Moreover, it must be noted that the relationship between feelings of safety (the subjective safety) and the actual number of crashes (the objective safety) is weak (see the archived SWOV factsheet Subjective safety in traffic).
