ANGRY residents in the Lanehead area of Burnley will tonight confront county council bosses with a clear message: "Make the roads around our homes safe!"

Householders say speeding traffic has made their lives a misery and their appeals for traffic-calming have fallen on deaf ears.

They say cars are using roads as rat runs, speeding vehicles are smashing into walls and gardens, and children can not even reach the Underley Street playground safely and easily because it is surrounded by too-busy roads.

Now the newly-formed Kibble Community Action Group is demanding early action to ease traffic problems and calm tempers.

The group has already raised a 330-name petition calling for traffic calming which will go to Lancashire road chiefs at County Hall. And tonight residents will pack Kibble Bank Community centre to demand answers from county bosses.

The meeting will be chaired by local county councillor and development control chairman Terry Burns, who will be accompanied by a senior road traffic officer Peter Andrew.

Action group chairman Barbara Leyland said: "The time has come when we are saying enough is enough.

"We have put up with excuses and being told there is no money for too long."

She added: "People's lives are being put in danger and it can't go on. They can find money for other areas of Burnley so why not us?

"People seem to have the impression that we are a comfortable, nice area which can look after itself.

"The fact is we are in many ways a neglected area which doesn't get its share of what is on offer."

Mrs Leyland said another issue was the lack of a doctor's surgery, with elderly residents and mothers with young children literally having to catch a bus to get to a doctor.

She said: "We want action and soon."

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