Crap Towns / Hertfordshire / Chorleywood
Chorleywood
0/100Crap Score
981st crappest of 984 towns, and 26th in Hertfordshire. 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
Chorleywood. Nothing wrong. Annoying.
Leafy, posh and very pleased with itself. The last bus goes before the evening's properly started.
Chorleywood gave its name to the way they make factory sliced bread, and that's the worst thing it's ever done. It's posh and leafy, and the vandals, the fly-tippers and the sewage have all gone somewhere else. Smug little place. So the locals fight about parking instead, outside the shops, on the estate tracks and over the permits.
The buses have given up on it. The last one on a Wednesday goes at 7.49pm, so a night out in Chorleywood is over before the telly's warmed up. No pool, either. The map can't find a single park, and six in ten people live more than a short walk from one, which will be news to everyone walking a dog on the Common.
What the score is made of
Ten ingredients, each marked out of 100. Higher is crapper.
Chorleywood's 81 for air pollution means it's crapper than 81% of towns.
- Air pollution81/10010.2 µg/m³ of nitrogen dioxide and 7.5 of fine particles, 2024 average
- Rain32/100121 days of rain a year, at least 1 mm, 1991 to 2020 average
- Serious road collisions27/1001.7 per 10,000 people a year, fatal and serious, 2021 to 2025
- Broadband26/1003.4% of premises can't get gigabit, January 2026, and 8.5% across the Three Rivers council area
- Food hygiene23/1000.0% rated 0 to 2, of the 43 food businesses with a rating
- Deliberate fires12/1002.5 per 10,000 people a year, April 2023 to March 2026
- Fly-tipping10/1004.7 incidents per 1,000 people a year, Three Rivers council area, 2022-23 to 2024-25
- Sewage spills2/1000.0 spill hours per 10,000 people a year, storm overflows within 1 km, 2023 to 2025
- Anti-social behaviour1/1005.4 per 1,000 people a year, September 2023 to August 2026
- Criminal damage and arson1/1002.6 per 1,000 people a year, September 2023 to August 2026
| Pos | Town | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 18 | Royston | 18 |
| 19 | St Albans | 18 |
| 20 | Ware | 8 |
| 21 | Sawbridgeworth | 7 |
| 22 | Hertford | 7 |
| 23 | Abbots Langley and Kings Langley | 7 |
| 24 | Rickmansworth | 4 |
| 25 | Harpenden | 3 |
| 26 | Chorleywood | 0 |
Chorleywood by numbers
Thinking of moving here? Don't say we didn't warn you.
Crime, muck and dodgy water
- 33.1 crimes per 1,000 people a year (September 2023 to August 2026) Better: 57% lower than the typical town's 76.2
- 63 reports of potholes and bad road surfaces on FixMyStreet, the most reported problem in the year to October 2026 Worse: 49.9 per 10,000 people, 14.7x the typical town's 3.4
What's left on the high street
- 8 pubs, 4 hairdressers, 3 charity shops, 1 vape shop on the map here as of 1 October 2026
- 2 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
- 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
- 7.49pm last bus out on a Wednesday Worse: Earlier than 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%
- 61.4% live more than 400 metres from a park or play space, and OS maps no public park here Worse: 4x the typical town's 15.5%
- 1,620 hours of sunshine a year (1991 to 2020 average) Better: 6% higher than the typical town's 1,532
Three Rivers council
- £2,422 Band D council tax (2026-27) About the same: £30 more than the English average
- 18% of Hertfordshire County Council's unclassified roads should have been considered for maintenance (2025-26) Worse: 13% higher than England's 16%
- 5 ombudsman complaints upheld against the council in 2025-26
- More on the council
Have a crap-off
Chorleywood 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.