The steeper approach has so many advantages for smaller aircraft. To list just a few:
1. You stand a chance of making the airfield after an engine failure. (I once had one at the end of downwind leg. I was in a motor glider, so the only thing it changed was my stress level - but it brought home the fact that it can happen at any time.)
2. You spend less time at low level. At one airfield I regularly fly from, trees and terrain before the runway cause unpleasant and unpredicatble low-level turbulence in a crosswind. A flatish approach forces you to fly through it. A steep approach, and the problem vanishes.
3. It's more neighbourly to fly a bit higher at a low power setting.
Having said all of that, though, there are still plenty of places where you'd be stuffed if your engine failed on approach. Anyone been to Antwerp? Houses in every direction right up to the airport fence.