Three Lancashire districts named in the top 5 most peaceful places to live in the North West

Three areas of Lancashire have been named in the top five most peaceful places to live in the North West- with one coming right out on top.

A new study by property specialists SAM Conveyancing has scored every local authority in England and Wales on four measures that decide whether somewhere is genuinely peaceful to live in: how quiet it is at night, crime levels, how much public green space residents have, and how close homes are to nightlife venues such as pubs, bars and clubs.

Taking first place is West Lancashire, with a peace score of 66.8 out of 100 and the region's highest national placing in 73rd.

Its recorded crime rate of 48.6 offences per 1,000 residents is the second lowest in the North West and among the 40 lowest in England and Wales, well under the national median of 71.1, and residents have 41.6 square metres of green space each, the fourth most in the region.

Regarding nightlife, 2.56% of residents live within 200 metres of a cluster of three or more licensed premises, ninth lowest in the region, compared to a national median of 3.10%.

Its weakest measure was then night noise with 53.2% of residents exposed to noise above 40 decibels and 6.9% above 55 decibels, but this is still quieter than the regional median of 59.5% and 7.0%.

Chorley is then second on 63.1 out of 100 and 88th nationally.

Its residents have 66.4 square metres of green space each, the second most in the North West and the 23rd most in England and Wales, and only 2% live beside a cluster of licensed premises which is the fourth lowest in the region.

Chorley then has the sixth lowest crime rate in the North West with 58.7 offences per 1000 residents but night time noise was also this area’s weakest measure too, with 63.4% of residents exposed to noise above above 40 decibels and 9.2% above 55 decibels- both higher than the regional average.

The borough’s success in this peaceful places ranking comes just days after Chorley was at the centre of a viral TikTok video looking at whether it was the happiest place to live in Britain.

At the end of last year, Rightmove named Chorley the second happiest place to live in the North West and the 17th nationally, but Tiktoker Dan Openshaw visited the town recently and his views on whether that truly is the case amassed over 50,000 views.

The only other Lancashire borough to make the national top 100 and North West top 10 was Fylde, which comes in as the fifth most peaceful place to live in the North West with an overall score of 55.5 out of 100,

Fylde boasts the quietest nights in the North West, with just 3.7% of residents exposed to noise above 55 decibels, the level at which sleep is most commonly disrupted, compared to a national median of 6.3%.

Its crime rate of 53.5 offences per 1,000 residents is the third lowest in the region.

The exact methodology

Each authority was scored on four equally weighted measures, each converted to a percentile rank:

• the share of residents exposed to night-time noise from roads and railways across seven thresholds from 40 to 70 decibels
• recorded crimes per 1,000 residents
• publicly accessible green space per resident
• the share of residents with three or more licensed premises within 200 metres of their home.

Night-time noise exposure was calculated by testing 37.7 million individual address points against Defra's national noise maps and aggregating via LSOA population, so the score reflects what residents are exposed to at their own front doors.

How does the rest of Lancashire compare?

What were the full North West* rankings?

*For context, the North West as a whole is noisier and has higher recorded crime than England and Wales overall (regional medians of 59.5% above 40 decibels and 75.5 offences per 1,000, compared to national medians of 49.8% and 71.1).

What has been said about the survey?

Andrew Boast, CEO of SAM Conveyancing, said: "Buyers spend months on the things they can measure – the price, the survey, the school catchment – and almost no time on the thing they will notice on their first night in the house, which is how quiet it actually is. A Sunday afternoon viewing tells you very little about what a road sounds like at two in the morning, or what happens when the pub two streets away turns out.

"The encouraging thing is that this is all knowable before you commit. What the road carries at night, how close the nearest railway line is, what is licensed within a few hundred metres – that information is public, and it costs nothing to look at. Anyone moving home should be asking those questions before they exchange rather than after."

Of England and Wales' 318 local authorities, 316 are ranked; the Isles of Scilly and the City of London are excluded because their resident populations of roughly 2,100 and 8,600 distort every per-resident measure.