RESIDENTS on a Rossendale estate are feeling more secure thanks to a "cast iron" partnership with police and council.

An "alley gating" scheme restricting access to flats on the Edgeside estate, Waterfoot, is being hailed a success.

The scheme was introduced after residents from Crabtree Avenue and Fairfield Avenue reported significant problems with local youths and visiting criminals who used stairwells and alleys between the flats as meeting points and quick escape routes.

Thanks to a £2,500 project funded by police, Rossendale council and Lancashire Partnership Against crime, the youths, criminals and associated damage and graffiti have now gone.

The project involved installing iron alley gates to restrict access.

Local residents are pleased with the results which include a drop in the number of burglaries, juvenile nuisance and criminal damage. Rossendale Council neighbourhood officer Julie Smith commented: "Before we got the alley gates some residents wanted to move even though some of them had lived there for years.

"Now we have the gates they feel much more secure."

She added: "And, because the area looks better and is no longer blighted by nuisance and crime, the flats are now fully let."

Police sergeant Graeme Fearn said the project was an example by what could be achieved by residents working in partnership with police and other agencies."

He said: "Working as individuals it is unlikely that either ourselves, the residents or local authority would have been able to solve the problems highlighted in this case.

"But by joining forces we were able to make a real difference."