Crap Towns / Aberdeenshire / Banchory
Banchory
36/100Crap Score
Too small for the table, which starts at 10,000 people, but it still scores 36. Higher scores are crapper.
Have your say
Crap Town of the Year 2026/27
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Letters from the locals
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agree it's crap have defended it
Banchory. Writing to the council again.
A posh Deeside town where nothing happens, so the residents complain about everything instead.
Banchory is the gateway to Royal Deeside. It's got salmon leaping at the Falls of Feugh and coffee shops where the butcher used to be. Crime barely registers.
Banchory put 634 problems on FixMyStreet in a year, more than forty times the typical Scottish town's rate, 161 of them potholes. The town isn't falling apart. It's just got opinions. The one thing really worth a moan is the broadband: gigabit reaches 8.0% of premises, which on Deeside counts as a scandal.
It has 1 Greggs, which per head is four times the typical town's. Royal Deeside, that.
What the score is made of
Ten ingredients, each marked out of 100. Higher is crapper.
Banchory's 100 for broadband means it's crapper than 100% of towns.
- Broadband100/10092.0% of premises can't get gigabit, January 2026, and 51.5% across the Aberdeenshire council area
- Food hygiene80/10011.5% told to improve, of the 52 food businesses inspected
- Rain68/100142 days of rain a year, at least 1 mm, 1991 to 2020 average
- Sewage spills59/100397 spill hours per 10,000 people a year, storm overflows within 1 km, 2025
- Serious road collisions58/1001.9 per 10,000 people a year, fatal and serious, 2021 to 2025
- Fly-tipping50/100
- Deliberate fires5/1004.4 per 10,000 people a year, April 2023 to March 2026
- Anti-social behaviour3/1002.5 per 1,000 people a year, January 2023 to December 2025
- Criminal damage and arson1/1002.6 per 1,000 people a year, January 2023 to December 2025
- Air pollution0/1002.2 µg/m³ of nitrogen dioxide and 4.1 of fine particles, 2024 average
| Pos | Town | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Peterhead | 50 |
| In danger of becoming nice from here down.– | Banchory | 36 |
| 2 | Fraserburgh | 35 |
| 3 | Inverurie | 21 |
| 4 | Stonehaven | 14 |
| 5 | Ellon | 6 |
| 6 | Westhill | 5 |
Below the dashed line: in danger of becoming nice.
Banchory by numbers
Thinking of moving here? Don't say we didn't warn you.
Crime, muck and dodgy water
- 18.5 crimes per 1,000 people a year (January 2023 to December 2025) Better: 66% lower than the typical Scottish town's 54.4
- 161 reports of potholes and bad road surfaces on FixMyStreet, the most reported problem in the year to October 2026 Worse: 212 per 10,000 people, 37.9x the typical Scottish town's 5.6
What's left on the high street
- 3 pubs, 4 hairdressers, 3 charity shops, 1 bookmaker, 1 Greggs on the map here as of 1 October 2026
- 1 public toilet on the map (October 2026) Worse: 1.3 per 10,000 people, 19% lower than the typical town's 1.6
Getting about, getting online, getting rained on
- 12.29am last bus out on a Wednesday About the same: About the same as the typical town's 12.14am
- 3.5% of premises can't get superfast broadband (January 2026) Worse: 7x the typical town's 0.5%
- 12.4% live more than 400 metres from a park or play space Better: 20% lower than the typical town's 15.5%
- 1,367 hours of sunshine a year (1991 to 2020 average) Worse: 11% lower than the typical town's 1,532
Aberdeenshire council
- £1,686 Band D council tax (2026-27) About the same: £33 more than the Scottish average
- 27% of Aberdeenshire council's unclassified roads should have been considered for maintenance (2025-26) Better: 25% lower than Scotland's 36%
- 88 ombudsman complaints decided in 2025-26, none upheld About the same: 33.4 per 100,000 residents, about the same as Scotland's 34.7
- 96.7% of the streets checked passed as clean (2025-26) About the same: About the same as Scotland's 92.2%
- More on the council
Have a crap-off
Banchory 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.