Photo: Tigershrike · Public domainLooe is on the coast, on the South West Coast Path
The sea makes up 40% of the area within 5 km. The Cornwall National Landscape begins 0.1 mi from the town’s edge. Parks and playing fields in Looe add up to 0.1 ha for every 1,000 residents; the typical UK town has 2.1. Looe grades C− for the outdoors: #30 of 35 in Cornwall. A character grade: it isn’t part of the overall grade.
What kind of outdoors town is Looe?
Read from the data: what stands out first, good and bad.
Looe’s strongest suit is the sea, followed by two protected landscapes close by. Where it falls short is park space per person.
Looe grades C− for the outdoors
Each chart is every UK town of 1,000 or more on one measure: the green bar is Looe, the dashed line the typical town. The number is the share of towns it beats; the five are averaged and the average ranked again.
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Graded, never part of the overall grade (like History and Civic life). It measures what is mapped: OS Open Greenspace leaves out woodland and open-access land that isn’t a park, and OpenStreetMap’s rural paths are more complete in some places than others.
Looe is 43rd of 60 UK towns its size for the outdoors
The 60 UK towns and cities of 5,100 to 5,500 people with an Outdoors Grade. Hover a dot for its figures; tap one for its page.
Looe falls furthest behind on park space per resident, where 58 of the 59 others do better.
Show as a table
| Town | Outdoors | Green space | Near a park | Path per km² | Protected | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Cookham Berkshire | A+ | 8.3 | 96% | 4.3 | 19% |
| 2 | Weston Dorset | A+ | 2.5 | 95% | 7.6 | 0% |
| 3 | Whitehill Hampshire | A+ | 10.2 | 74% | 5.1 | 58% |
| 4 | Hungerford Berkshire | A+ | 9.1 | 85% | 3.2 | 100% |
| 5 | St Ives Cornwall | A | 0.8 | 89% | 3.5 | 24% |
| 6 | Budleigh Salterton Devon | A− | 2.7 | 70% | 2.3 | 38% |
| 7 | Edwinstowe Nottinghamshire | A− | 5.6 | 90% | 4 | 0% |
| 8 | Hoylake Merseyside | A− | 3.5 | 83% | 2.6 | 0% |
| 9 | Brotton North Yorkshire | A− | 1.4 | 89% | 3 | 2% |
| 10 | Eynsham Oxfordshire | A− | 3 | 94% | 2.8 | 1% |
| 11 | Northam Devon | A− | 6.8 | 43% | 2 | 16% |
| 12 | Highbridge Somerset | B+ | 2.9 | 83% | 2.9 | 0% |
| 13 | Sonning Common Oxfordshire | B+ | 2.6 | 60% | 3.7 | 74% |
| 14 | Llantwit Major South Glamorgan | B+ | 3.2 | 83% | 2.4 | 0% |
| 15 | Drighlington West Yorkshire | B+ | 4.1 | 92% | 3.3 | 0% |
| 16 | Whitchurch Hampshire | B+ | 2.3 | 75% | 3.3 | 43% |
| 17 | New Alresford Hampshire | B+ | 2 | 94% | 2.3 | 38% |
| 18 | Waverley and Catcliffe South Yorkshire | B+ | 8.8 | 65% | 5 | 0% |
| 19 | Shrivenham and Watchfield Oxfordshire | B+ | 3.5 | 96% | 1.7 | 6% |
| 20 | Long Ashton Somerset | B+ | 10.2 | 66% | 4.7 | 0% |
| 21 | Dartmouth Devon | B+ | 2.1 | 71% | 1.8 | 45% |
| 22 | Newent Gloucestershire | B+ | 3 | 100% | 2.7 | 0% |
| 23 | Battle East Sussex | B+ | 1.7 | 64% | 4.3 | 84% |
| 24 | Fremington Devon | B+ | 1.4 | 88% | 2.1 | 10% |
| 25 | Benson Oxfordshire | B | 6 | 44% | 2.3 | 50% |
| 26 | Askern South Yorkshire | B | 8.5 | 100% | 1.5 | 0% |
| 27 | Longstanton and Northstowe Cambridgeshire | B | 4.3 | 86% | 2.8 | 0% |
| 28 | Rowlands Gill Tyne and Wear | B | 4.9 | 84% | 2.8 | 0% |
| 29 | Shinfield Berkshire | B | 1.6 | 100% | 3.5 | 0% |
| 30 | Redbourn Hertfordshire | B | 2.4 | 70% | 3.2 | 11% |
| 31 | Virginia Water Surrey | B | 14.5 | 72% | 3 | 0% |
| 32 | Llandrindod Wells Powys | B− | 4.5 | 88% | 2.3 | 0% |
| 33 | Hebden Bridge West Yorkshire | B− | 1.6 | 84% | 7.8 | 0% |
| 34 | Midhurst West Sussex | C+ | 0.3 | 28% | 4.3 | 100% |
| 35 | Brynmawr Gwent | C+ | 1.2 | 68% | 2.9 | 45% |
| 36 | Sacriston County Durham | C+ | 2.1 | 72% | 4 | 0% |
| 37 | Helsby Cheshire | C+ | 1.4 | 66% | 3.2 | 0% |
| 38 | Oakley Hampshire | C | 1.7 | 56% | 2.6 | 21% |
| 39 | Havercroft and Ryhill West Yorkshire | C | 1.6 | 81% | 2.8 | 0% |
| 40 | Bovingdon Hertfordshire | C | 1.4 | 55% | 2.3 | 26% |
| 41 | Shevington Greater Manchester | C | 1.8 | 73% | 2.9 | 0% |
| 42 | Waterbeach Cambridgeshire | C | 1.5 | 94% | 1.9 | 0% |
| 43 | Looe Cornwall | C− | 0.1 | 47% | 1.7 | 6% |
| 44 | Long Stratton Norfolk | C− | 1 | 89% | 2.5 | 0% |
| 45 | Bayston Hill Shropshire | C− | 1.8 | 70% | 2.7 | 0% |
| 46 | Ludgershall Wiltshire | C− | 0.7 | 72% | 1.9 | 32% |
| 47 | Llangefni Gwynedd | C− | 1.8 | 95% | 0.8 | 0% |
| 48 | Ingatestone Essex | C− | 3.2 | 56% | 2 | 0% |
| 49 | Measham Leicestershire | C− | 1.3 | 83% | 2.4 | 0% |
| 50 | Littlestone-on-Sea Kent | C− | 1.4 | 37% | 1.8 | 0% |
| 51 | Long Sutton Lincolnshire | D | 2.2 | 81% | 0.7 | 0% |
| 52 | Potton Bedfordshire | D | 1.3 | 77% | 2.1 | 0% |
| 53 | Blackrod Greater Manchester | D | 1 | 83% | 1.9 | 0% |
| 54 | Wigton Cumbria | D | 2.4 | 65% | 1 | 0% |
| 55 | Thornton West Yorkshire | D | 0.4 | 54% | 3.1 | 0% |
| 56 | Treherbert Mid Glamorgan | D | 1.2 | 73% | 1.6 | 0% |
| 57 | Eye Cambridgeshire | D | 1.4 | 77% | 0.6 | 0% |
| 58 | Moorends South Yorkshire | D | 2.2 | 39% | 0.8 | 0% |
| 59 | Winslow Buckinghamshire | D− | 1.4 | 59% | 1.5 | 0% |
| 60 | Ravenshead Nottinghamshire | D− | 0.1 | 0% | 1.9 | 0% |
Parks, footpaths & countryside
Tap a number to zoom to a park. Tap a layer to hide it. The dashed line is Looe’s built-up area.
5 in 10 Looe residents live within a 5-minute walk of a park
Each square is 1 in 100 residents: green lives within 400 m of a public park, garden or playing field (Census 2021 output areas against OS Open Greenspace).
About 2,800 people live further than that. Playing fields count, so a park within reach isn’t always one with paths or trees; 4 playgrounds are mapped in and around the town, about one for every 1,329 residents.
Cornwall and Tamar Valley both start about 5 miles from Looe
Protected landscapes within 30 km, by direction and distance from the edge of the built-up area; circle size shows each one’s area. National Landscapes were called Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty until 2023.
6% of the land within 5 km of Looe is National Park or National Landscape, more than 68% of UK towns. Dartmoor National Park covers 956 km² and has been a National Park since 1951.
Looe is on the South West Coast Path
25 km of footpaths, bridleways and rights of way are mapped in Looe and the kilometre around it, 1.7 km for every square kilometre (the typical UK town has 3.0). Bars show each route’s kilometres within 2 km of the town.
The South West Coast Path, a national route, passes Looe.
Waymarked walks are OpenStreetMap walking routes. Public rights of way are only as complete as the map in each area.
The best walking months in Looe: May to September
The town’s 1991–2020 averages (Met Office HadUK-Grid) and the daylight at its latitude. Outlined months have 12½+ hours of daylight, highs of 15 °C or more and little rain for the town.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Daylight (h) | 8.5 | 10.0 | 11.7 | 13.7 | 15.4 | 16.4 | 16.0 | 14.5 | 12.5 | 10.6 | 8.9 | 8.0 |
| High (°C) | 9 | 9 | 11 | 13 | 15 | 18 | 20 | 20 | 18 | 15 | 12 | 10 |
| Rain (mm) | 132 | 97 | 82 | 85 | 66 | 75 | 79 | 100 | 81 | 121 | 138 | 141 |
May is the driest month (66 mm) and July the warmest (highs of 20 °C). Winter days are short, about 8 hours of daylight in December, and 141 mm of rain falls in December, the wettest month. Frost comes on about 11 nights a year. The climate in Looe →
The coast and beaches near Looe
40% of the area within 5 km of Looe is sea. 18 beaches are mapped within 5 km, 10 with a name.
The South West Coast Path passes the town.
Sea: the area outside the ONS coastline (mean high water). Bathing water quality is published by the Environment Agency (England) and Natural Resources Wales; check it before swimming.
4 playgrounds
Mapped within 2 km of the town in OpenStreetMap, against the typical UK town its size per resident. Named places are listed with directions; unnamed ones are only counted.
Every named place, with directions
Viewpoints 1
Plus 1 viewpoint without a name on the map.
Picnic sites 2
Plus 2 picnic sites without a name on the map.
Campsites 3
Slipways 2
Plus 2 slipways without a name on the map.
The outdoors in nearby towns
The nearest towns of 1,000+ within 12 miles. Tap a town for its outdoors page.
Fowey, 8.5 miles away, grades A, the best next door: 91% of its residents live within 400 m of a park. Liskeard, Dobwalls and Fowey have at least twice Looe’s green space per resident.
Questions about the outdoors in Looe
Is Looe near a National Park?
Yes. Dartmoor National Park begins 15 mi east of the town’s edge. It covers 956 km² and has been a National Park since 1951. The nearest protected landscape of any kind is the Cornwall National Landscape, 0.1 mi away.
What are the best walks near Looe?
4 waymarked walking routes pass within 2 km of the town, including the South West Coast Path (Section 34: Polperro to Portwrinkle), Polperro to Looe coast walk, Lantic Bay, Mid & SE Cornwall and Hendersick and Talland Bay Loop, Lansallos.
How many people in Looe live near a park?
47% of residents live within 400 m, about a 5-minute walk, of a public park, garden or playing field (Census 2021 output areas against OS Open Greenspace). The typical UK town is 83%.
When is the best time of year for walking in Looe?
May to September: the longest days, the warmest afternoons and the least rain of the year, from the Met Office 1991–2020 averages.
Is Looe good for walking?
Paths are thinner than most towns: 1.7 km of footpath and right of way per square kilometre, more than 22% of UK towns. For park space per person it beats 1% (0.1 ha per 1,000 residents).
How is the Outdoors Grade worked out?
From five measures, each placed among UK towns of 1,000 or more: public green space per resident, the share living near a park, National Park or National Landscape within 5 km, footpaths per square kilometre, and the sea within 5 km. It is a character grade and isn’t part of Looe’s overall grade.
Where Looe’s outdoors figures come from
- Parks and green space: Ordnance Survey OS Open Greenspace (parks and gardens, playing fields, play spaces, and their access points). Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right 2026, Open Government Licence v3.0.
- National Parks and National Landscapes: Natural England and Natural Resources Wales boundaries, areas and designation dates, Open Government Licence v3.0.
- Footpaths, walking routes, beaches and things to do: © OpenStreetMap contributors, Open Database License (ODbL), via Geofabrik, 16 October 2026.
- Historic parks, listed buildings and monuments: Historic England, National Heritage List for England, Open Government Licence v3.0.
- Rain and temperature: Met Office HadUK-Grid 1991–2020 averages for the town; daylight calculated from its latitude.
- The sea: ONS Countries (December 2024) boundaries clipped to mean high water. Residents near a park: ONS Census 2021 output areas.
- Grade: TownRatings’ Outdoors Grade, ranked against UK towns only.
Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Contains HM Land Registry data © Crown copyright and database right 2026. Contains OS data © Crown copyright and database right 2026 (ONS boundaries). Northern Ireland: Source: NISRA; contains Land & Property Services data and Ordnance Survey of Northern Ireland information, © Crown copyright, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Scotland: contains National Records of Scotland data, Registers of Scotland data and SEPA data, © Crown copyright / © SEPA 2025, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.