GANGS of daytime street drinkers could be targeted by police.
 

Residents have complained about drinkers congregating in the St Botolph’s underpass leaving pedestrians running a gauntlet of abuse and intimidation.
 

The problem appeared to have gone away with many of the culprits banned from town but it has now returned.
 

And the police have promised to respond.
 

Town centre Insp Jim White said: “It was a problem in the past so we launched Operation Tertiary.
 

“It involved going down every day to disperse them, confiscating and pouring away the alcohol and banning them from the town centre for 24 hours.
 

“We also used some far reaching ASBOs and it was effective.
 

“Now we have more resources in the town centre, and if there are problems again, we will bring back Op Tertiary.”


Insp White explained the drinkers, who also congregate around St Botolph’s Priory and around the graveyard behind the Art Centre, can be responsible for 40 or 50 incidents of anti social behaviour in a month and it is not something the police or the community will put up with.
 

He added: “It means complete and utter misery for those commuters and pedestrians that have to go under the roundabout.
 

“We don’t want it and want it to have stopped before we get into the summer.”