Crap Towns / Essex / Halstead
Halstead
12/100Crap Score
867th crappest of 984 towns, and 27th in Essex. 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
Halstead. Nice flowers. No station.
Halstead wins In Bloom awards. It hasn't got a railway station.
Halstead's all hanging baskets, flower beds and a white mill by the river, and it wins prizes for it. Brilliant. It hasn't got a station, so getting to London means driving to someone else's. The High Street is steep, quiet and losing shops, and the teenagers have sod all to do.
It hardly rains, which is handy for the flowers. A fifth of the place can't get gigabit broadband, so the teenagers can't even sit indoors on their phones properly. The pollution record shows 6 serious incidents since 2016, the last one fertiliser on the land in 2021. Even the muck's for the flowers.
What the score is made of
Ten ingredients, each marked out of 100. Higher is crapper.
Halstead's 87 for broadband means it's crapper than 87% of towns.
- Broadband87/10020.7% of premises can't get gigabit, January 2026, and 9.7% across the Braintree council area
- Food hygiene68/1004.1% rated 0 to 2, of the 73 food businesses with a rating
- Sewage spills49/100269 spill hours per 10,000 people a year, storm overflows within 1 km, 2023 to 2025
- Air pollution46/1007.0 µg/m³ of nitrogen dioxide and 7.0 of fine particles, 2024 average
- Serious road collisions26/1001.7 per 10,000 people a year, fatal and serious, 2021 to 2025
- Criminal damage and arson19/1004.9 per 1,000 people a year, September 2023 to August 2026
- Fly-tipping16/1005.9 incidents per 1,000 people a year, Braintree council area, 2022-23 to 2024-25
- Anti-social behaviour15/1006.1 per 1,000 people a year, September 2023 to August 2026
- Deliberate fires5/1001.7 per 10,000 people a year, April 2023 to March 2026
- Rain3/100108 days of rain a year, at least 1 mm, 1991 to 2020 average
| Pos | Town | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 23 | Braintree | 21 |
| 24 | Stanford-le-Hope | 17 |
| 25 | Brentwood | 17 |
| 26 | Great Dunmow | 13 |
| 27 | Halstead | 12 |
| 28 | Rayleigh | 11 |
| 29 | Chelmsford | 9 |
| 30 | Hockley and Hawkwell | 7 |
| 31 | Maldon | 6 |
Halstead by numbers
Thinking of moving here? Don't say we didn't warn you.
Crime, muck and dodgy water
- 60.3 crimes per 1,000 people a year (September 2023 to August 2026) Better: 21% lower than the typical town's 76.2
- 3 reports of abandoned vehicles on FixMyStreet, the most reported problem in the year to October 2026 Worse: 2.2 per 10,000 people, 2.4x the typical town's 0.9
- 6 serious pollution incidents within 1 km since 2016, the latest in 2021
What's left on the high street
- 8 pubs, 3 banks on the map here as of 1 October 2026
- 0.0% of takeaways rated 0 to 2 for hygiene (0 of 13) Better: Against the typical town's 4.0%
- 1 banking hub opened here
- 3 public toilets on the map (October 2026) Better: 2.2 per 10,000 people, 38% higher than the typical town's 1.6
- 2 public swimming pools open Better: 1.4 per 10,000 people, 2x the typical English town's 0.7
Getting about, getting online, getting rained on
- 11.57pm last bus out on a Wednesday Worse: Earlier than the typical town's 12.14am
- 0.6% of premises can't get superfast broadband (January 2026) Worse: 20% higher than the typical town's 0.5%
- 20.1% live more than 400 metres from a park or play space Worse: 30% higher than the typical town's 15.5%
- 1,655 hours of sunshine a year (1991 to 2020 average) Better: 8% higher than the typical town's 1,532
Braintree council
- £2,280 Band D council tax (2026-27) About the same: £112 less than the English average
- 10% of Essex County Council's unclassified roads should have been considered for maintenance (2025-26) Better: 38% lower than England's 16%
- 1 ombudsman complaint upheld against the council in 2025-26
- More on the council
Have a crap-off
Halstead 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.