THE message from residents to Arpley tip bosses was loud and clear: ‘Get out of our town’.

Protestors turned out in force outside the Sankey Bridges landfill site to block the path of lorries this morning from 7am.

Plans for rubbish to continue to be dumped at the tip until 2025 were turned down in January this year but residents have been incensed by FCC Environment chiefs appealing the decision seven months later and preparing a second application.

Waving ‘Say no’ placards and booing wagons as they passed, the group living on the nearby Saxon Park estate and on Old Liverpool and Liverpool Road have said ‘enough is enough’.

Clr Pat Wright (LAB - Bewsey and Whitecross) said: “People expected this to end when the company’s licence runs out in October but now we have to fight again.

“They haven’t been good neighbours since the start and residents have had enough.

“Warrington doesn’t use this landfill site and all the rubbish is imported from other areas so why should we continue to be the dumping ground of the north west?

“I think this has shown everybody is committed to fighting this application.”

Campaigner Norman Crompton, from Saxon Park, said residents regularly have to put up with trucks who never adhere to the 20mph speed limit, swarms of flies and said the smell is disgusting.

Resident Amanda Bohanna also reported damage to homes due to the vibrations of lorries on Old Liverpool Road.

She added the company had ‘made enough profits but were greedy for more’.

John Boyle from the Arpley Landfill Opposition Group (ALOG) said: “When we won and the application was turned down, there were people welling up and there was relief it was over.

“They left the appeal right to the last minute and we can do this again any time we want.”

Residents are being urged by the group to submit objections to the council again before the September 26 deadline.

A Cheshire Police spokesman confirmed the protest passed peacefully.

An FCC Environment spokesman said: “We have submitted an appeal to the Planning Inspectorate and await details from them on the timescales for this appeal to be heard.

“We are also in the process of submitting a second application for the site which is a separate matter to the appeal and allows for the short term operation of the site to close and restore the site appropriately.

“We are required to do this now prior to the existing consent expiring in October.”

Commenting on the protest, the spokesman added: “Members of the community of course have the right to make their views known on any issue and we respect this.

"We are in active discussion with the community through the site’s community liaison group. "However, the protest does not alter the fact that the Arpley landfill site is needed to play a part in the treatment of waste which is generated in the region.

“The site is open and continues to operate as normal.”