Highways chiefs are hoping to come up with a plan of action this autumn to try to dissuade delivery drivers from using a route past people’s homes to reach Felixstowe’s shops.

Frustrated residents have been keeping a log of lorries using their road – and are fed up with the noise, pollution and potential danger.

Householders in Beatrice Avenue say increasing numbers of articulated lorries have been using their street to reach Hamilton Road – rather than the designated route via Garrison Lane and High Road West.

Suffolk county councillor Nick Barber, chairman of the Felixstowe and district community panel of the Safer Neighbourhood Team, said highways officers had carried out an analysis of the problem, including traffic counts.

These showed that around 3.2% of traffic in Garrison Lane in one direction was HGVs and 2.7% in the other. In Beatrice Avenue it was 1.7% in both directions.

Officers felt that the totals were not high and probably in line with the results they had expected.

Mr Barber said: “The totals are relatively low though it is appreciated that for residents in Beatrice Avenue it can be an annoying problem.

“Traffic orders are expensive but officers have agreed to carry out further analysis to come up with measures to tackle the situation.”

Details were likely to be brought before the joint town and county council Felixstowe highways advisory group in the autumn, with extra signage to direct lorries down Garrison Lane likely to be the solution.

Felixstowe has a weight limit to prevent HGVs entering the town, but this does not apply to vehicles making deliveries.

Resident Jim Cadbury said the number of lorries using Beatrice Avenue had grown significantly in recent years, many of them very early in the morning or late at night, and were often very noisy.

He felt the size of the trucks posed a hazard to pedestrians and other drivers.

He said: “I think there is an issue with the sat navs used by these vehicles which is sending them on the easiest route rather than the best route for the size of the lorries.”

Householders have kept a record of the lorries’ numbers and times and direction of travel but many of the trucks had no company markings and were clearly contract vehicles.

They said Garrison Lane had wide verges, a lack of housing and had been built for heavy traffic, while Beatrice Avenue was a tree-lined residential street crossed by schoolchildren and other pedestrians. Changes at Grove Road junction had made it easier to avoid using Garrison Lane.