Late-night pothole repairs frustrate residents in St Vincent's Road, Dartford
Noisy pothole repair work kept people awake until midnight and closed off a busy road causing traffic chaos.
Residents of St Vincent's Road, in Dartford, were kept awake late into the night when loud road resurfacing work took place outside their bedroom windows.
Michele Glass, who lives in St Vincent's Road, said she and her neighbours were furious at the disturbance on Monday.
"It was very noisy from 7.30pm until midnight on our part of the street. I was speaking with my neighbours and we were saying it felt like we had shaking in our houses.
"I didn't go to bed until they had finished, there was just too much noise."
She added: "It was like having an engine in your front room."
And it wasn't just Michele who struggled to sleep. Her neighbour has a six-year-old boy who was also kept up way past his bedtime.
Another neighbour also had a disturbed evening, despite living at the "quiet" end of the street.
Chloe said: "The middle of St Vincent's was loud. I am lucky I was up at the quiet end but it wasn't that quiet. There were cars driving up and down and there was lots of shouting and beeping."
It's not just the noise that was a problem.
Chloe said: "None of us knew there was going to be a road closure until it was suddenly shut."
The closure came as a surprise to regular users of the road, who claim they were given no warning of the planned closure.
Hayley Hind lives in Temple Hill and was trying to drive through St Vincent's Road to reach her friend's 90-year-old mum, who was in need of emergency help.
"I urgently needed to get to my friend's mum," she said. "I use that road almost daily and hadn't seen any warnings. I was really annoyed. There wasn't even a decent diversion in place."
As a result of the closure Hayley ended up adding an extra 15 minutes to her emergency dash.
"My friend is on holiday and I promised to look after her mum while she was away as she has just had an operation and can't use one of her arms," she said. "She was stuck in her chair so I was rushing to help her."
She added: "There were cars just stopping at the road closed sign as they had no idea where to go."
Cllr Laura Edie said she would be putting the issue to the council.
"I welcome the road being relayed," she said. "However, I haven't received any correspondence and there haven't been any signs forewarning of the closures, so the surrounding roads have been complete chaos.
"On the Kent County council website it states that signs will be put up two to four weeks before the work begins, but that has not been the case."
She added: "This is indicative of a recurring lack of communication by KCC regarding these types of works, resulting in an unnecessary level of stress for road users.
"I also wonder if it is suitable to carry out night works on a residential street with a high population of children, whose sleep may be disturbed by the loud vehicles.
'It was like having an engine in your front room...'
"I will be contacting Kent County Council for an explanation over this level of disorganisation."
Residents say they did not receive any letters warning them of the closure.
A KCC spokesman said: "Advance signs, ‘no parking’ cones and signs were delivered to the site last week.
"We also completed a letter drop to residents along the affected stretch of road last week.
"The works, which were to remove potholes, needed to be completed at night because of the busy nature of the road and crews were told to complete this as quickly as possible. This was not part of our planned resurfacing programme."
The work was due to last another two nights.