TRAVELLERS who set up camp in one of the city’s largest parks have been moved on by police

At least 30 caravans and other vehicles arrived at Preston Park in Brighton on Friday evening. Passersby reported seeing people driving across the park on motorbikes and quad bikes.

A police spokesman said: “A group of travellers who arrived at Preston Park on Friday, July 15, were served a Section 61 notice to vacate and did so without incident before lunchtime on Sunday, July 17. The area is now clear.”

A section 61 notice gives police the power to order a group to leave once a landowner has taken reasonable steps to remove them.

The weekly park run in Preston Park was cancelled on Saturday after organisers expressed safety concerns about the travellers.

Organisers said: “They’re not on the course but there are so many vehicles and quad bikes driving dangerously we daren’t go ahead.”

Brighton and Hove city councillor Dawn Barnett called for the council do to more to tackle unauthorised camps by travellers in public parks and said such groups should be directed to the travellers' site in Patcham.

She said: “They shouldn’t be allowed on any public park - it’s a park for residents in the city who pay council tax.

“Residents shouldn’t have to put up with this. They do not want to be mucked around by travellers.

“If they behaved themselves, keep areas clean and tidy, get off their quad bikes, people would accept them if they stayed for a day or two.

“The council has a soft touch. They say Brighton and Hove is a City of Sanctuary - but who for? Certainly not the residents.”

Cllr Barnett said travellers who park in unauthorised areas should be directed to the official site in Patcham or moved out of the city.

She said: “We put in the site at a lot of expense and the arrangement was that the travellers would go to that site if there was room and if it was full, they would leave the city.”

It comes just a few months after another group of caravans parked at the park for a week before being moved on