TRAVELLERS have set up an illegal site on public land in Wickford.

About five caravans pitched up on top of the Shotgate roundabout, in Southend Road, on Saturday.

They had been joined by another six caravans in the adjacent Southend Road when our reporter attended the scene yesterday.

Children could be seen playing outside and families were setting up fuel cannisters.

Office worker Robert Davies, 38, who lives close to the encampment, urged the group to keep the land clean and tidy.

He said: “As long as they clean up after themselves and don’t cause any trouble, what’s the harm?

“They’re just camped slap bang on the roundabout. It’s a bold move.”

The arrival of the caravan comes as legal battles are underway to stop the illegal development of traveller sites of Hovefields Avenue, Wickford.

Judge Graham Wood told the landowner of a five-acre site earlier this month that no more breaches of an injunction made in October should take place.

Yet by 6.40am the following Saturday, the first of 28 lorries - delivering an estimated 460 tonnes of hardcore - rolled down to the Tidds Plot, on Hovefields Avenue, off the A127.

People living close to the site fear it will be turned into ‘Dale Farm Mark II’ - with the finished park having space for 50 plots.

Stay-at-home-mum Sarah Lambert, of Crouchview Close, said: “All of the traveller activity around here does make me feel nervous.

“We haven’t had any trouble but it does cause a worry.”

Essex Police visited the Southend Road site on Saturday. The travellers told them they will move on from the public land.

An Essex County Council spokesman said the travellers will be served a Section 77 eviction notice today if they fail to go.

Basildon mayor and Wickford councillor David Harrison said: “It’s a very tricky and complex situation.

“The trouble is, this borough seems to attract travellers for long weekends when they know the authorities won’t be around to evict them.

“I did speak to them and requested that they keep the area clean and they said that they would.”