Gipsies are to launch a legal fight to stay on in Colchester, after pitching their caravans at a former travellers' site.
Six families have gathered at the derelict Essex County Council site in Haven Road, The Hythe.
Other gipsies in the area, including members of a group of 30 who moved in recently at the old Severalls Hospital, off Boxted Road, were expected to join them today.
Representatives are due to appear at Colchester County Court on Tuesday, where they will argue for their right to stay on until officials find them somewhere else to go in the borough.
Colchester Council has offered land east of Severalls Lane to replace The Hythe site, which is earmarked for redevelopment.
County hall chiefs are still deciding if the project should go ahead.
Traveller Martin Ward said yesterday: "There isn't a proper travellers' site in Colchester, but this land is actually a travellers' site. We have nowhere else to go."
More in today's Evening Gazette
Published Thursday, September 1, 2005
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