This study investigates the spatial dimension of socio-physical safety in residential neighbourhoods resulting from the use of CPTED target-hardening elements in the study area. The use of target-hardening elements of the CPTED principles in towns and cities, including Benue State, can improve the socio-physical environment, shaping people's perceptions of liveability and safety. Since the 1960s, various scholars have highlighted both the positive and negative aspects of utilising environmental design elements in the physical development of the built environment. However, the practice effectively prevents, controls, and reduces burglary and theft. Moreover, it increases urban street concealment, street isolation, entrapment, and the prevalence of ghost areas. Therefore, corroborating findings from either of the two positions on the significance of target-hardening elements to the socio-physical environment motivated this study in Otukpo town, Benue State, Nigeria. The methodological processes involve primary data collection through questionnaires and personal observation, and secondary data through a literature review. A purposive sample, along with descriptive and analytical methods, was used to present and analyse the data. First, the results show spatial variation in the application of target hardening elements; second, variation in residents' perceived socio-physical safety in the study area. According to the findings, wall fences with iron gates and street barricades are more prominent and pronounced in the low-density residential neighbourhood, with 79% and 67% of burglary-proof iron bars deployed, respectively. In high-density residential neighbourhoods, the deployment of fences and street barricades is 33% more effective at deterring burglary. The application of burglary-proof iron bars and a target-hardening approach to the socio-physical environment changes the landscape from open, interactive (sociable) to solitary/lonely (unsociable) built environments, as streets are confined and constrained by high walls on both sides. These, therefore, reduce the likelihood of escape routes and encourage territorial control of space, supporting privacy and property boundary delineation and demarcation, which has been the emphasis of Oscar Newman (1971). The study concludes that the construction of wall fences and barricades by homeowners appears to be a continuing phenomenon, as homeowners and residents consider these structures to serve specific purposes, such as security, privacy, and property boundaries. Thus, the negative purpose is that high wall fences are supportive hideout places for stolen goods; for example, the case in Makurdi town, where more than fifty (50) stolen motorcycles, six (6) tricycles and other stolen goods were found in a compound with a tall fence wall along George Akume Way in November, 2025. Hence, the study recommends proper urban design legislation and policy formulation to encourage the development control authority to enforce monitoring of the practice and utilisation of environmental design elements in the built environment during building plan approval, site development, and construction.