Crap Towns / Shetland Islands / Lerwick
Lerwick
65/100Crap Score
Known as Da Toon.
Too small for the table, which starts at 10,000 people, but it still scores 65. 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
Lerwick. Bring a coat. And food.
Shetland's capital, where the ferry's off, the shelves are bare and they set fire to a longship for fun.
Lerwick is the end of the line. The sun manages 1,174 hours a year, and in winter it's dark by the middle of the afternoon. When the ferry gets cancelled the supermarket shelves go bare and there's fuck all for tea. Every January they dress up as Vikings, march through Da Toon with burning torches and set fire to a longship, which is the only time anyone's properly warm.
The food's a gamble even when it does arrive. One kitchen in five got told to sort itself out, four times the typical Scottish town's share, and a third of the takeaways did too. Gigabit broadband reaches 2.6% of premises. The sewage overflows spill at nearly twice the typical town's rate, the vandals had a busy 2025, and TSB packed up and left.
What the score is made of
Ten ingredients, each marked out of 100. Higher is crapper.
Lerwick's 100 for broadband means it's crapper than 100% of towns.
- Broadband100/10097.4% of premises can't get gigabit, January 2026, and 80.0% across the Shetland Islands council area
- Rain99/100197 days of rain a year, at least 1 mm, 1991 to 2020 average
- Food hygiene96/10021.2% told to improve, of the 66 food businesses inspected
- Sewage spills66/100509 spill hours per 10,000 people a year, storm overflows within 1 km, 2023 to 2025
- Anti-social behaviour54/1008.7 per 1,000 people a year, January 2023 to December 2025
- Criminal damage and arson53/1007.3 per 1,000 people a year, January 2023 to December 2025
- Fly-tipping50/100
- Serious road collisions39/1001.5 per 10,000 people a year, fatal and serious, 2021 to 2025
- Air pollution2/1004.4 µg/m³ of nitrogen dioxide and 3.5 of fine particles, 2024 average
- Deliberate fires2/1002.2 per 10,000 people a year, April 2023 to March 2026
| Pos | Town | Score |
|---|---|---|
| – | Lerwick | 65 |
Lerwick by numbers
Thinking of moving here? Don't say we didn't warn you.
Crime, muck and dodgy water
- 44.3 crimes per 1,000 people a year (January 2023 to December 2025) Better: 19% lower than the typical Scottish town's 54.4
- 1 reports of potholes and bad road surfaces on FixMyStreet, the most reported problem in the year to October 2026 Better: 1.5 per 10,000 people, 73% lower than the typical Scottish town's 5.6
What's left on the high street
- 5 pubs, 7 hairdressers, 4 charity shops, 4 banks on the map here as of 1 October 2026
- 33.3% of takeaways inspected told to improve (4 of 12) Worse: 3.7x the typical Scottish town's 9.1%
- 1 bank branch closure announced since 2022 Worse: 14.9 per 100,000 people, 4.4x the typical town's 3.4
- 5 public toilets on the map (October 2026) Better: 7.5 per 10,000 people, 4.7x the typical town's 1.6
Getting about, getting online, getting rained on
- 0.4% of premises can't get superfast broadband (January 2026) Better: 20% lower than the typical town's 0.5%
- 6.5% live more than 400 metres from a park or play space Better: 58% lower than the typical town's 15.5%
- 1,174 hours of sunshine a year (1991 to 2020 average) Worse: 23% lower than the typical town's 1,532
Shetland Islands council
- £1,488 Band D council tax (2026-27) Better: £165 less than the Scottish average
- 40% of Shetland Islands council's unclassified roads should have been considered for maintenance (2025-26) Worse: 11% higher than Scotland's 36%
- 15 ombudsman complaints decided in 2025-26, none upheld Worse: 65.3 per 100,000 residents, 1.9x Scotland's 34.7
- 99.6% of the streets checked passed as clean (2025-26) Better: 8% higher than Scotland's 92.2%
- More on the council
Have a crap-off
Lerwick 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.