Crap Towns / South Lanarkshire / Lanark
Lanark
70/100Crap Score
Too small for the table, which starts at 10,000 people, but it still scores 70. 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
Lanark. The tourists go downhill.
The tourists head for the old mills at New Lanark below the town. Lanark gets charity shops and a lot of public toilets.
Lanark has eleven times the typical town's public toilets per head. Nobody's sure why. The tourists come for the mills at New Lanark and the Falls of Clyde, then drive straight through the town past the charity shops and the empty windows. Once a year it goes daft for Lanimers, and every spring the weans run round the church swinging paper balls on strings at each other for Whuppity Scoorie. Carluke reckons Lanark gets all the council money. Looking at the High Street, it's hard to see where it went.
What the score is made of
Ten ingredients, each marked out of 100. Higher is crapper.
Lanark's 82 for food hygiene means it's crapper than 82% of towns.
- Food hygiene82/10011.9% told to improve, of the 84 food businesses inspected
- Rain79/100155 days of rain a year, at least 1 mm, 1991 to 2020 average
- Broadband77/10014.3% of premises can't get gigabit, January 2026, and 10.7% across the South Lanarkshire council area
- Anti-social behaviour68/10010.3 per 1,000 people a year, January 2023 to December 2025
- Serious road collisions68/1002.0 per 10,000 people a year, fatal and serious, 2021 to 2025
- Criminal damage and arson62/1008.0 per 1,000 people a year, January 2023 to December 2025
- Deliberate fires58/10024.8 per 10,000 people a year, April 2023 to March 2026
- Fly-tipping50/100
- Sewage spills24/10059.1 spill hours per 10,000 people a year, storm overflows within 1 km, 2025
- Air pollution2/1003.3 µg/m³ of nitrogen dioxide and 4.4 of fine particles, 2024 average
| Pos | Town | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Hamilton | 95 |
| 2 | Rutherglen | 88 |
| 3 | Blantyre | 85 |
| 4 | Larkhall | 82 |
| – | Lanark | 70 |
| 5 | Cambuslang | 62 |
| 6 | East Kilbride | 59 |
| 7 | Carluke | 52 |
Lanark by numbers
Thinking of moving here? Don't say we didn't warn you.
Crime, muck and dodgy water
- 57.3 crimes per 1,000 people a year (January 2023 to December 2025) Worse: 5% higher than the typical Scottish town's 54.4
- 1 problem reported on FixMyStreet in the year to October 2026 Better: 1.1 per 10,000 people, 95% lower than the typical Scottish town's 20.1
What's left on the high street
- 2 pubs, 2 hairdressers, 3 charity shops, 1 bookmaker, 1 bank on the map here as of 1 October 2026
- 1 bank branch closure announced since 2022 Worse: 11.2 per 100,000 people, 3.3x the typical town's 3.4
- 16 public toilets on the map (October 2026) Better: 17.9 per 10,000 people, 11.2x the typical town's 1.6
Getting about, getting online, getting rained on
- 10.29pm 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%
- 5.4% live more than 400 metres from a park or play space Better: 65% lower than the typical town's 15.5%
- 1,249 hours of sunshine a year (1991 to 2020 average) Worse: 18% lower than the typical town's 1,532
South Lanarkshire council
- £1,468 Band D council tax (2026-27) Better: £185 less than the Scottish average
- 33% of South Lanarkshire council's unclassified roads should have been considered for maintenance (2025-26) Better: 8% lower than Scotland's 36%
- 87 ombudsman complaints decided in 2025-26, none upheld Better: 26.6 per 100,000 residents, 23% lower than Scotland's 34.7
- 94.0% 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
Lanark 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.