St Albans, Welwyn and Hatfield have been named as three of Hertfordshire’s top commuter hotspots by the Evening Standard.

%image(15463709, type="article-full", alt="Welwyn Garden City is praised for its great schools")

They were listed alongside Cheshunt as the best Herts commuter towns within half an hour of King’s Cross.

A quarter of buyers moving to Welwyn Garden City and Hatfield are from the capital, the article reveals – but the author seems unsure why.

%image(15528495, type="article-full", alt="The "period charm" of Old Hatfield's properties balances out the town's less desirable features")

While both areas are praised for their “cracking” schools, the editorial is somewhat scathing about Hatfield’s “lacklustre town centre” and “dismal social housing”, adding “the Galleria Shopping Centre is not much better”.

It praises the town’s “pockets of great housing” however, including the “period charm” of Old Hatfield, and commuter favourite Birchwood, where properties are “extremely similar to the houses of outer north London, but about half the price”.

It concludes that “Hatfield’s great downfall is poor shopping and lack of nightlife — but lovely St Albans is only six miles west.”

Ouch. Though St Albans costs considerably more, the Standard thinks it’s worth it, raving about the “perennially popular little cathedral city, with its period houses and boutique and café-packed high street” which it describes as “Hertfordshire’s answer to Islington, complete with dreadful traffic but with the added benefit of fantastic schools.”