Travellers have abandoned a community field they were occupying in Canterbury yesterday - leaving behind the rubbish residents feared.

A group of up to a dozens caravans and vehicles moved onto the Kingsmead Field on Wednesday night, prompting a visit by council officials early the next morning.

Discussions took place as the council sought legal measures to have them removed, but the travellers left of their own accord yesterday.

A spokesman for the authority said it had to go through a legal process, including doing welfare checks on the travellers.

Last night a spokesman Rob Davies said: "The travellers who set up camp at Kingsmead Field left have left the site.

“Our control room staff used CCTV to track them all of the way to the Rheims Way where they appeared to be heading to the London-bound A2.

“They have not been spotted in the district since. Officers will be checking the sit to see whether any cleaning is required.”

But concerns had been raised by the Friends of Kingsmead Field, whose volunteers care for and manage it as a community asset, that it would be left in a state, as happened when travellers moved onto the site in June last year.

When the Kentish Gazette spoke to the travellers yesterday, they said, "we're not all the same" and insisted they would bag up any rubbish.

They also commented on why they were being blamed for causing a mess when nearby council estates were "strewn with rubbish".

But co-ordinator of the Friends, Sian Pettman said that since their departure, bags of rubbish, gas cylinders and other unpleasant rubbish now needed clearing from the site.

She urged the city council to erect security fencing to make it more difficult for travellers to move onto the land in the future which the authority is now considering.