RESIDENTS and sports groups are concerned that expensively revamped playing fields have become a first port of call for travellers.

Groups of travellers repeatedly set up camp at Hulton Lane Playing Fields, in Daubhill, over the summer, damaging the pitches which were revamped as part of a £475,000 investment.

Residents have called for the council to do more to protect the pitches from travellers’ vehicles as well as quad bikes and motorbikes.

But on Saturday night a group of 10 caravans again moved on to Hulton Lane Playing Fields, in Daubhill, prompting fears the pitches have become the go-to location for travellers in the area.

They left again on Monday after being served directions by council officers.

Councillor Darren Whitehead , who chaired a meeting to address the matter early this month, is again calling for more to be done to protect the fields and reassure residents.

He said: “My principal concern is residents have now seen this happen and one of the issues at the meeting was anxiety that this is now becoming a frequent event, that the fields are becoming a pre-destination for travellers.

“They know they are available and there’s access and become used in a habitual way – it’s become evidence of that – they know about the field and they use it.

“So it needs either a deterrent or some security.”

He added that residents patience was running low after a summer of rising tensions.

He said: “It’s got to the state now where people are ready to be agitated, some of the messages I get from residents are loathsomely despondent. They say it’s happened again but nothing is going to happen.”

“The main message is if they came to this field in autumn perhaps there’s an awareness of this resource so, therefore, a sense of it becoming a habit and all the more calls for a deterrent or security.”

And Cllr Whitehead said the money spent improving the fields could go to waste if steps weren’t taken to deter inappropriate use of the fields.

He said: “These fields have seen so much investment and are being used by various sporting clubs which is precisely what the council wants to encourage, but it defeats the purpose if its use is interrupted by non-residents for whatever reason.”

The new football pitches at Hulton Lane only came into use for the first time this season and teams are concerned that they could be ruined if steps aren’t taken to keep vehicles off the grass.”

Affy Adam, is chairman on Bolton United Football Club, whose two senior now play their home games at Hulton Lane.

He said: “It’s completely open to the public. It’s an open field. The council have spent so much money on it and if they can do something to fence it off, then why not? It would be a big thing for us.”

“The pitches could get ruined. What’s the point in spending so much money and then not protecting it?

“It’s a big improvement on what we had before, but it isn’t going to be like that if we don’t maintain it properly and make sure quad bikes, bikes and caravans can’t get on it.

“There’s no point have a facility like that when it’s all open to the public.”