Two groups of Travellers set up camps in Lowestoft over the past week – leaving a trail of litter and damage behind them.

About 11 caravans arrived last Wednesday afternoon, as families pitched up with vehicles on the Belvedere Road car park.

Later that evening about 17 caravans, Transit vans and cars arrived on the Clifton Road car park.

Police liaised with Waveney District Council – as the landowners of both car parks – and staff from Waveney Norse visited both sites, providing skips, portable toilets and bin bags.

The Travellers on the Clifton Road car park left on Friday night, while the other Travellers left the Belvedere Road car park on Tuesday evening.

A council spokesman said: 'We would like to apologise to people who usually use the car parks for any inconvenience. This was a challenging time, as we are not aware of any previous occasion when Waveney District Council has had two separate groups of travellers on our property in Lowestoft at the same time. But our staff, working closely with our partners, reacted promptly to manage the situation and minimise the disruption to the public. In both cases, Waveney Norse also worked quickly to clean up the car parks and re-open them, after the travellers had moved on.'

The council spokesman added that both groups of Travellers had moved on before the council 'took legal proceedings to force them off our property.'

The spokesman added: 'The travellers on the Clifton Road car park left the site late Friday night, May 22, and into the early hours of Saturday morning. The Waveney Norse cleansing team moved in promptly to carry out the cleaning up operation. A few of the black bin bags were torn and the contents had spilled out. We believe seagulls would have done this damage. The rubbish bins were full and the skip was around a quarter full. The boundary fence had received some damage. The car park was swept by the mechanical sweeper and all rubbish removed, before the car park was reopened to the public,' the spokesman added.

'The other group of travellers vacated the Belvedere Road car park on Tuesday (May 26) evening. Unfortunately, this was left in a worse condition than Clifton Road. There was a lot of litter. The skip had not been used but most of the rubbish had all been placed together in one area. The area was given a disinfectant washdown, the car park was swept and rubbish removed by Waveney Norse.'