Crap Towns / Gloucestershire / Chipping Sodbury
Chipping Sodbury
13/100Crap Score
Known as Sodding Chipbury.
Too small for the table, which starts at 10,000 people, but it still scores 13. 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
Pretty. And, crucially, not Yate.
Pretty old High Street, and a town whose whole personality is not being Yate.
Chipping Sodbury has a wide old High Street, a clock tower and a Mop Fair, and its main selling point is that it isn't Yate, which is right next door. The charity shops and pubs do alright. Late on a weekend some idiots make a racket on the High Street, and the council got rid of the street marshals.
The one thing Sodbury does a lot of is setting fire to the grass. The deliberate fires come in at nearly four times the typical town's rate, most of them grass and woods. That's not Yate. That's you.
What the score is made of
Ten ingredients, each marked out of 100. Higher is crapper.
Chipping Sodbury's 89 for deliberate fires means it's crapper than 89% of towns.
- Deliberate fires89/10022.2 per 10,000 people a year, April 2023 to March 2026
- Rain67/100139 days of rain a year, at least 1 mm, 1991 to 2020 average
- Broadband62/1007.7% of premises can't get gigabit, January 2026, and 14.6% across the South Gloucestershire council area
- Food hygiene49/1002.3% rated 0 to 2, of the 43 food businesses with a rating
- Air pollution41/1007.7 µg/m³ of nitrogen dioxide and 6.4 of fine particles, 2024 average
- Serious road collisions31/1001.8 per 10,000 people a year, fatal and serious, 2021 to 2025
- Fly-tipping26/1007.1 incidents per 1,000 people a year, South Gloucestershire council area, 2022-23 to 2024-25
- Criminal damage and arson12/1004.2 per 1,000 people a year, September 2023 to August 2026
- Anti-social behaviour9/1008.1 per 1,000 people a year, September 2023 to August 2026
- Sewage spills2/1000.0 spill hours per 10,000 people a year, storm overflows within 1 km, 2023 to 2025
| Pos | Town | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 10 | Brockworth | 31 |
| 11 | Yate | 31 |
| 12 | Stoke Gifford | 30 |
| 13 | Churchdown | 24 |
| 14 | Frampton Cotterell and Winterbourne | 21 |
| – | Chipping Sodbury | 13 |
| 15 | Bradley Stoke | 6 |
| 16 | Bishop's Cleeve | 6 |
| 17 | Thornbury | 2 |
Chipping Sodbury by numbers
Thinking of moving here? Don't say we didn't warn you.
Crime, muck and dodgy water
- 47.4 crimes per 1,000 people a year (September 2023 to August 2026) Better: 38% lower than the typical town's 76.2
- 22 reports of potholes and bad road surfaces on FixMyStreet, the most reported problem in the year to October 2026 Worse: 27.4 per 10,000 people, 8.1x the typical town's 3.4
What's left on the high street
- 9 pubs, 9 hairdressers, 5 charity shops, 1 bank on the map here as of 1 October 2026
- 1 public toilet on the map (October 2026) Worse: 1.2 per 10,000 people, 25% lower than the typical town's 1.6
- None public swimming pools open Worse: Against the typical English town's 0.7 per 10,000 people
Getting about, getting online, getting rained on
- 10.31pm last bus out on a Wednesday Worse: Earlier than the typical town's 12.14am
- 0.3% of premises can't get superfast broadband (January 2026) Better: 40% lower than the typical town's 0.5%
- 13.6% live more than 400 metres from a park or play space Better: 12% lower than the typical town's 15.5%
- 1,602 hours of sunshine a year (1991 to 2020 average) About the same: About the same as the typical town's 1,532
South Gloucestershire council
- £2,551 Band D council tax (2026-27) Worse: £159 more than the English average
- 9% of South Gloucestershire council's unclassified roads should have been considered for maintenance (2025-26) Better: 44% lower than England's 16%
- 12 ombudsman complaints upheld against the council in 2025-26
- More on the council
Have a crap-off
Chipping Sodbury 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.