Crap Towns / Dumfries and Galloway / Annan
Annan
65/100Crap Score
Too small for the table, which starts at 10,000 people, but it still scores 65. Higher scores are crapper.
Have your say
Crap Town of the Year 2026/27
See the raceThe public vote. It's separate from the Crap Score, and it closes on 31 December 2027.
Letters from the locals
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agree it's crap have defended it
Annan. Shut on Sundays.
The nuclear power station shut, the bank's shutting and the Sunday buses never started.
Annan's big employer was Chapelcross, the nuclear power station up the road. It stopped in 2004, they blew up the cooling towers, and now there's talk of a data centre on the site, which has the town arguing before a brick's gone down. Meanwhile the Bank of Scotland's going and there isn't a bus out of town on a Sunday. Not one.
Worse is what goes in the river. Storm overflows near Annan spilled for 1,886 hours per 10,000 people in 2025, nearly seven times the typical town's. The vandals do half as much again as the typical Scottish town's, mostly round the bus station, which is somewhere to sit when there's no bus.
The bricked-up windows on Port Street are older than any of it: somebody was dodging the window tax. Annan Athletic fans reckon Dumfries is a dump. The Crap Score agrees with them, for once.
What the score is made of
Ten ingredients, each marked out of 100. Higher is crapper.
Annan's 95 for broadband means it's crapper than 95% of towns.
- Broadband95/10018.7% of premises can't get gigabit, January 2026, and 33.1% across the Dumfries and Galloway council area
- Sewage spills93/1001,886 spill hours per 10,000 people a year, storm overflows within 1 km, 2025
- Rain89/100165 days of rain a year, at least 1 mm, 1991 to 2020 average
- Criminal damage and arson86/10010.7 per 1,000 people a year, January 2023 to December 2025
- Anti-social behaviour68/10010.4 per 1,000 people a year, January 2023 to December 2025
- Food hygiene54/1005.8% told to improve, of the 52 food businesses inspected
- Fly-tipping50/100
- Serious road collisions21/1001.2 per 10,000 people a year, fatal and serious, 2021 to 2025
- Deliberate fires14/1008.1 per 10,000 people a year, April 2023 to March 2026
- Air pollution0/1003.0 µg/m³ of nitrogen dioxide and 4.3 of fine particles, 2024 average
| Pos | Town | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Dumfries | 87 |
| – | Annan | 65 |
Annan by numbers
Thinking of moving here? Don't say we didn't warn you.
Crime, muck and dodgy water
- 46.8 crimes per 1,000 people a year (January 2023 to December 2025) Better: 14% lower than the typical Scottish town's 54.4
- 176 reports of potholes and bad road surfaces on FixMyStreet, the most reported problem in the year to October 2026 Worse: 202 per 10,000 people, 36.1x the typical Scottish town's 5.6
What's left on the high street
- 4 pubs, 3 hairdressers, 2 banks, 1 Greggs on the map here as of 1 October 2026
- 1 bank branch closure announced since 2022 Worse: 11.5 per 100,000 people, 3.4x the typical town's 3.4
- 3 public toilets on the map (October 2026) Better: 3.5 per 10,000 people, 2.2x the typical town's 1.6
Getting about, getting online, getting rained on
- 11.31pm last bus out on a Wednesday, and none on a Sunday Worse: Earlier than the typical town's 12.14am
- 0.9% of premises can't get superfast broadband (January 2026) Worse: 1.8x the typical town's 0.5%
- 3.5% live more than 400 metres from a park or play space Better: 77% lower than the typical town's 15.5%
- 1,398 hours of sunshine a year (1991 to 2020 average) Worse: 9% lower than the typical town's 1,532
Dumfries and Galloway council
- £1,579 Band D council tax (2026-27) About the same: £74 less than the Scottish average
- 57% of Dumfries and Galloway council's unclassified roads should have been considered for maintenance (2025-26) Worse: 1.6x Scotland's 36%
- 38 ombudsman complaints decided in 2025-26, 1 upheld Better: 26.1 per 100,000 residents, 25% lower than Scotland's 34.7
- 98.4% of the streets checked passed as clean (2025-26) Better: 7% higher than Scotland's 92.2%
- More on the council
Have a crap-off
Annan against your mate's town, and a match ticket to rub it in.
- ?Fly-tippingper 1,000, council area?
- ?Anti-social behaviourper 1,000 people?
- ?Serious road crashesper 10,000 people?
- ?Sewage spillshours per 10,000 people?
- ?Food hygienerated poor?
- ?Criminal damageper 1,000 people?
- ?Dirty airµg/m³?
- ?No gigabitof premises can't get it?
- ?Deliberate firesper 10,000 people?
- ?Raindays a year?
Ten ingredients. One verdict. Who's crapper? The higher Crap Score takes it.