SOUTHAMPTON residents have vented their anger at “kids on motorcycles plaguing the city”.

“Ridiculously loud” bikes have been doing laps of Hamble Lane, Bursledon Road and Portsmouth Road for months, according to one city resident.

She complained of nuisance riders who appear on “a nightly basis until the early hours”.

Locals from areas including Sholing, Swaythling, Thornhill and Weston have all expressed their concerns surrounding teens riding motorbikes through parks, over pavements and even without helmets.

Responding to a Daily Echo post on social media, Falon Myers said: “We get them ragging their bike out the front of our garden. They also go through the alleyway outside our house, we have young children that play out the front and it scares me that one day they’ll come through and knock one of the children over.”

Josephine Northover, added: “Weston has a lot of motorbikes riding through estates all hours and Weston shore, revving up loudly and total disrespect for people and their properties, at times dumping them and setting them on fire.”

Meanwhile, Claire Anderson, 47, from Coxford, said: “Police need to work closely with the local communities and start taking motorbike theft and nuisance riding seriously.”

She said youths “ride recklessly on the roads at all times of the day and night and cause huge issues for other motorists, pedestrians”.

However, one reader argued, “the kids need stuff to do. More money to help the young into jobs or training and to give them somewhere they can go and learn about bikes and ride safely”.

A previous social media post from Southampton Cops said: “We know motorbike nuisance is a big problem for the communities we serve, particularly on the east side of the city. We will keep doing what we can to tackle motorbike nuisance here on the east side of Southampton, in the same way, that other neighbourhood teams are tackling the problem in the other areas of the district. So please continue to report motorbike nuisance to us - we may not be able to attend immediately as violent crimes will take precedence, but we do take it seriously.”