Crap Towns / North Ayrshire / Kilwinning
Kilwinning
58/100Crap Score
Known as the Crossroads of Ayrshire.
411th crappest of 984 towns, and 3rd in North Ayrshire. Higher scores are crapper.
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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
They shoot a wooden parrot here.
They've been firing arrows at a wooden bird on the abbey tower for centuries. Not much else has happened.
The Crossroads of Ayrshire is a posh way of saying folk drive straight through Kilwinning. The planners lumped it in with Irvine New Town in the sixties and it's never forgiven them. The abbey's a ruin and the shops in the middle are heading the same way.
Hardly any pubs on the map, but not one of the 12 takeaways inspected was told to improve. The chippy's sound, then. Anti-social behaviour's been climbing, mind, from 6.8 to 9.9 since 2023.
What the score is made of
Ten ingredients, each marked out of 100. Higher is crapper.
Kilwinning's 97 for rain means it's crapper than 97% of towns.
- Rain97/100178 days of rain a year, at least 1 mm, 1991 to 2020 average
- Serious road collisions69/1002.0 per 10,000 people a year, fatal and serious, 2021 to 2025
- Broadband67/1008.4% of premises can't get gigabit, January 2026, and 16.3% across the North Ayrshire council area
- Food hygiene67/1007.3% told to improve, of the 69 food businesses inspected
- Fly-tipping50/100
- Deliberate fires50/10022.4 per 10,000 people a year, April 2023 to March 2026
- Anti-social behaviour47/1007.7 per 1,000 people a year, January 2023 to December 2025
- Criminal damage and arson41/1006.5 per 1,000 people a year, January 2023 to December 2025
- Sewage spills38/100156 spill hours per 10,000 people a year, storm overflows within 1 km, 2025
- Air pollution2/1003.5 µg/m³ of nitrogen dioxide and 4.3 of fine particles, 2024 average
| Pos | Town | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Saltcoats | 87 |
| 2 | Irvine | 77 |
| 3 | Kilwinning | 58 |
| 4 | Largs | 46 |
| 5 | Ardrossan | 46 |
Kilwinning by numbers
Thinking of moving here? Don't say we didn't warn you.
Crime, muck and dodgy water
- 40.0 crimes per 1,000 people a year (January 2023 to December 2025) Better: 26% lower than the typical Scottish town's 54.4
- 1 problem reported on FixMyStreet in the year to October 2026 Better: 0.6 per 10,000 people, 97% lower than the typical Scottish town's 20.1
What's left on the high street
- 3 pubs, 1 charity shop on the map here as of 1 October 2026
- 0.0% of takeaways inspected told to improve (0 of 12) Better: Against the typical Scottish town's 9.1%
- 1 banking hub opened here
- 2 public toilets on the map (October 2026) Worse: 1.2 per 10,000 people, 25% lower than the typical town's 1.6
Getting about, getting online, getting rained on
- 11.47pm last bus out on a Wednesday Worse: Earlier than the typical town's 12.14am
- 0.1% of premises can't get superfast broadband (January 2026) Better: 80% lower than the typical town's 0.5%
- 13.1% live more than 400 metres from a park or play space Better: 15% lower than the typical town's 15.5%
- 1,361 hours of sunshine a year (1991 to 2020 average) Worse: 11% lower than the typical town's 1,532
North Ayrshire council
- £1,686 Band D council tax (2026-27) About the same: £33 more than the Scottish average
- 31% of North Ayrshire council's unclassified roads should have been considered for maintenance (2025-26) Better: 14% lower than Scotland's 36%
- 50 ombudsman complaints decided in 2025-26, none upheld Worse: 37.4 per 100,000 residents, 8% higher than Scotland's 34.7
- 89.6% 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
Kilwinning 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.