Crap Towns / Surrey / Ash and Ash Vale
Ash and Ash Vale
19/100Crap Score
Known as Scratch Nail.
800th crappest of 984 towns, and 33rd in Surrey. 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
Ash. Nearly Aldershot.
Loads of new houses, no town centre and Aldershot right over the fence.
Ash is a pile of new houses with nothing to go with them. There's no proper centre, the station ticket office is always shut, and the shiny new bridge over the railway mainly moved the traffic noise nearer the bedrooms. Ask anyone where they live and they'll say near Guildford. It's near Aldershot. Everyone knows it's near Aldershot.
It's got 33 play spaces, more than twice the typical town's per head, and hardly any actual park to go with them, so it's swings on every corner and nowhere to kick a ball. There's 1 charity shop and 10 pubs. Somebody's got their priorities straight.
What the score is made of
Ten ingredients, each marked out of 100. Higher is crapper.
Ash and Ash Vale's 65 for air pollution means it's crapper than 65% of towns.
- Air pollution65/1009.3 µg/m³ of nitrogen dioxide and 7.0 of fine particles, 2024 average
- Broadband53/1004.0% of premises can't get gigabit, January 2026, and 18.2% across the Guildford council area
- Serious road collisions49/1002.4 per 10,000 people a year, fatal and serious, 2021 to 2025
- Fly-tipping38/1009.0 incidents per 1,000 people a year, Guildford council area, 2022-23 to 2024-25
- Food hygiene36/1001.5% rated 0 to 2, of the 67 food businesses with a rating
- Sewage spills33/100113 spill hours per 10,000 people a year, storm overflows within 1 km, 2023 to 2025
- Rain32/100121 days of rain a year, at least 1 mm, 1991 to 2020 average
- Deliberate fires31/100
- Criminal damage and arson23/1005.1 per 1,000 people a year, September 2023 to August 2026
- Anti-social behaviour12/1008.7 per 1,000 people a year, September 2023 to August 2026
| Pos | Town | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 29 | Haslemere | 23 |
| 30 | West Molesey | 23 |
| 31 | Farncombe | 23 |
| 32 | Godalming | 22 |
| 33 | Ash and Ash Vale | 19 |
| 34 | Weybourne | 12 |
| 35 | Great Bookham and Fetcham | 9 |
| 36 | Ashtead | 8 |
| 37 | Frimley | 4 |
Ash and Ash Vale by numbers
Thinking of moving here? Don't say we didn't warn you.
Crime, muck and dodgy water
- 46.7 crimes per 1,000 people a year (September 2023 to August 2026) Better: 39% lower than the typical town's 76.2
- 657 reports of potholes and bad road surfaces on FixMyStreet, the most reported problem in the year to October 2026 Worse: 271 per 10,000 people, 79.7x the typical town's 3.4
- 6 serious pollution incidents within 1 km since 2016, the latest in 2025
What's left on the high street
- 10 pubs, 4 hairdressers, 1 charity shop, 1 vape shop on the map here as of 1 October 2026
- 4 public toilets on the map (October 2026) About the same: 1.6 per 10,000 people, about the same as the typical town's 1.6
- 1 public swimming pool open Worse: 0.4 per 10,000 people, 43% lower than the typical English town's 0.7
Getting about, getting online, getting rained on
- 12.18am last bus out on a Wednesday About the same: About the same as the typical town's 12.14am
- 0.2% of premises can't get superfast broadband (January 2026) Better: 60% lower than the typical town's 0.5%
- 12.9% live more than 400 metres from a park or play space Better: 17% lower than the typical town's 15.5%
- 1,631 hours of sunshine a year (1991 to 2020 average) Better: 6% higher than the typical town's 1,532
Guildford council
Have a crap-off
Ash and Ash Vale 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.