Our road has been invaded by camper van owners who pee in the bushes, have loud sex and RUIN our views… it’s a disgrace
CAMPER van owners are allegedly causing HAVOC on a stunning sea-front road - using bushes as toilets and having noisy sex in their vans.
Residents of Boscawen Road and Cliff Road in Falmouth, Cornwall, say they're sick of van-dwellers living permanently in their vehicles and treating the street as a "free campsite".
They claim one 52-seater coach that allegedly houses a family of five has been parked up since March.
While other vans have reportedly appeared in recent weeks as the summer holiday season gets under way.
There are currently no overnight parking restrictions on the road so police have not responded to requests to slap tickets on the windscreens, residents say.
Pensioner Pam Fuller, 86, has lived on Boscawen Road in the stunning location that overlooks popular Gyllyngvase beach for 40 years.
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She said: "This is a beautiful place. It used to be lovely to see parents parking here with their children for an hour or so, or elderly people enjoying the view and sea air.
"But they’ve all been pushed out. Once the camper vans have got their spot they mostly stay put for weeks or even months."
Her husband, Geoff Fuller, 88, said: "Our road has been turned into an unofficial, free camp site with no facilities.
"The nearest toilets are hundreds of yards away on the beaches and it’s obvious, by the smell, that some of the van occupants don’t bother using them. They just go in the bushes or the woods.
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"We know that you can’t buy a view. But neither should you be able to treat a public road like this."
Sun Online spoke to most of the residents affected by the line of 15 vans parked nose-to-tail opposite their homes.
Few agreed to speak on the record, saying they felt intimidated by aggressive language on occasions when they had tried to reason with campers.
One told us: "The woods and bushes stink like a cesspit. What’s happening is a disgrace.
"I’ve walked past the vans during the day and it’s very obvious, from the loud sounds coming from inside, that people are having sex.
"That’s not right or fair on parents and children walking alongside on the pavement.
"Residents here are not wealthy. We’ve worked hard all our lives for nice houses and we pay our taxes.
"Yet right opposite, just yards away, we’re effectively lumbered with a pop-up festival site."
Another said: "I was told by one camper that he was living there while his own home was up for rent on Airbnb.
"That’s like putting two fingers up to us."
RUDE WITH A VIEW
Some locals have also hit out through comments on.
One wrote: "Right along the seafront it stinks of urine.
"They just seem to get out their vans and pee in the hedges or on the path. Walk along and you will see the trails of pee on the pavements."
However another criticised residents posting: "If they actually engaged van owners in conversation rather than castigating them, they would find many of them are…responsible folk making the most of what nature offers us all."
Some Boscawen Road residents were also sympathetic. One woman said: "There are people living in those vans because they can’t afford a home.
"The coach houses a family of five. What are they supposed to do?"
No one was available for comment when Sun Online approached Falmouth Town Council.
However at its meeting earlier this month councillors were told a "working group" had been set up to liaise between camper van owners and residents.
The University of Exeter, which has a Falmouth campus, had also earmarked £5,000 for research on the problem as some students were among the van dwellers.
Falmouth town mayor Steve Eva said the main complaint he received was about the state of the vans.
"Some of the vans are quite pleasant, and made an effort with," he said. "And then [there’s] another van in which they have made no effort at all and have been quite abusive to people."
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Several local councillors approached by Sun Online declined to talk on the record because of "camper van sensitivities".
One told us: "People living in big houses seem to have more say than van dwellers who can’t find a home."
