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Residents in the Quendon Place area of Haverhill's Chalkstone estate who witness youngsters causing a nuisance around the so-called Aeroplane Park have been asked to ring police straightaway.

The play area (pictured) - so called because it has an aeroplane piece of play equipment - is one of the areas being targeted this month by Haverhill police's Safer Neighbourhood Teams (SNTs).

Each month the teams, which include agencies and residents, meet to determine three priorities for the next month.

Residents in the area have complained about youths hanging around and under-age drinking.

St Edmundsbury Council recently cut back trees in the area to open it up more.

But Sgt Sarah Bartley, who is in charge of the SNTs in Haverhill, said residents had been reluctant to ring at the time the nuisance ws going on.

Police attending after the event, when they were informed, generally found no one there.

"We would encourage people to ring us when the kids are there," she said. "It can be anonymously. We would rather have an anonymous call than no call at all.

"We have powers. It's in the alcohol-free zone, and there is under-age drinking. But we need to be called when it is actually going on."

She said youngsters from both Chalkstone and Clements estates were involved, and incidents occurred any time from 6.30pm through to 1am or 2am.

A meeting of various agencies involved took place yesterday (Monday) to consider further action.

Another issue being targeted this mnonth is anti-social behaviour in Queen Street between 10pm and 2am on Fridays and Saturdays, which had resulted in some windows being broken recently.

Police will be dealing with this via CCTV coverage and additional patrols.