RESIDENTS are being handed the power to catch motorists racing through their estates - by operating their own mobile speed camera sites.

But a road users pressure group today said it was concerned that the scheme may lead to people conducting vendettas on their neighbours.

The RAC added that there should be enough money from the £7.6million generated in speed camera fines in 2002 to pay for extra traffic police to do the job.

The scheme marks a change of focus in enforcement from main roads to smaller streets in residential areas and will use Lancashire Police's existing speed guns.

Residents will be selected to run the cameras through parish councils and given extensive training on how to operate the £300 speed guns.

Motorists caught by residents, who will be overseen by beat bobbies and community support officers, will receive warning letters.

If a lot of motorists are found to be speeding in an area, police will set up mobile speed camera sites to issue £60 fines with three penalty points.

The force sees the Operation Speed Watch idea, taken from a successful pilot scheme in Avon and Somerset, as a way of meeting the huge demand from East Lancashire communities to crack down on speeding.

Two pilot schemes on individual roads will be set up by April 1, one in the Pennine Division, covering Burnley, Pendle and Rossendale, and the other in the Eastern Division, covering Blackburn, Darwen, Hyndburn and the Ribble Valley.

But police expect the scheme to be rolled out to wherever the demand is by the end of the year.

Chief Insp Val Prince, head of road policing, denied it was a move to save on police manpower - and said it was about encouraging residents to work with officers to solve problems.

She added: "This is about trying to stop people being killed.

"If when we look at sites and there have been significant accidents, we may consider other ways of reducing speed, such as with speed cameras or traffic calming.

"The residents will record the details of the vehicle and the equipment will take a picture.

"We will probably send out a warning letter initially as one of the things we don't want to happen is for there to be confrontation between motorists and members of the public.

"If the beat managers are there at the time, they may wish to issue a verbal warning."

Lancashire Road Safety Partnership, including the police, has introduced a massive speed cameras programme in Lancashire in the past two years and there will be 320 fixed speed camera sites by April.

Sixty six people were killed on the county's roads in 2002 but that figure rose to 88 last year, fuelling concerns that cameras were not working. But the number of accidents fell from 8,261 to 7,343 in the same period.

Edmund King, executive director of road safety group the RAC Foundation, said: "There are concerns that if you use civilians you can get people targeting neighbours.

"There should be enough money going into the system to finance more traffic police.

"Because this is about warning people and education rather than enforcement I don't think it will do any harm and speeding in residential areas is a major problem, but should it be up to residents to take it into their own hands?"

Frank Priest, a parish councillor for Longridge, recently attended a meeting with police and council chiefs to work out ways to tackle speeding through Ribble Valley villages.

He said: "I don't like mobile cameras, they are entrapment. We have concerns about speeders through the villages, but if they have concerns they should install a camera."