Hundreds of drivers congregate, doing burnouts on Waipa streets. Photo: Supplied/Sally Drake
Waipā residents have been complaining for months that they feel intimidated when hundreds of drivers congregate, doing burnouts, speeding through streets and damaging properties.
Susan O'Regan was a district councillor last year when she sent a letter to the police minister demanding action against street racers in Waipā.
Now that she's mayor, she wants to push the issue forward by making it illegal for most cars to be on some streets between 9pm and 4am.
She said people forget how vulnerable remote communities can feel in the face of anti-social behaviour.
"I understand that there's often a lot of rubbish left around, abusive exchanges between these people and residents, and there have actually been occasions of people being assaulted," O'Regan said.
Road policing manager Inspector Tim Anderson said Waikato police had a strategy in place to respond to complaints of illegal street racing.
He said the police wanted to keep the roads safe for all users and if Waipā District Council's proposed bylaw was passed, it would be another tool they could use.
But resident Sally Drake said the community didn't feel police were keeping them safe.
Cars regularly congregate on her street to do skids and burnouts and the area is one that would close under the mayor's proposal.
Drake said the community was now talking seriously about taking matters into their own hands.
Damage to roads and rubbish left by racers in Waipa. Photo: Supplied/Sally Drake
"They're a danger to themselves, and they're a danger to anyone else in their vicinity. It's as simply as that," said Drake.
The community is frustrated to the point of exhaustion, she said.
Ayman is a car enthusiast and street racer. He said they go to country roads so that they don't disturb those in residential areas. He admits some racers drink and leave rubbish, and said in his experience the police do take action.
"A lot of us get cracked down on, and most of our cars get towed away," Ayman said.
He said he has literally been left on the side of the street by police and he's had to find his own way home in the middle of the night.
Ayman said if the council provided somewhere free and legal to take his car he wouldn't need to use the street.
"All we really want is at least a skid-pad that we don't have to pay for entry, that we can take our cars there, and skid it up," he said.
While Waipā residents are at the end of their tether when it comes to the racers, a new bylaw might not solve the problem.
A similar one was put in place in Christchurch in 2014 and the police said while it is a deterrent and is regularly enforced it hasn't stopped anti-social road users.