Ohoka riled by boy racers

A large gathering of alcoholguzzling youths doing burnouts under the instruction of a woman with a loudspeaker is the latest in boy racer activity riling Ohoka residents.

Residents in the North Canterbury settlement say ‘‘packmob behaviour’’ is intimidating and keeping locals awake at night, and the rural roads are being left covered in rubbish and discarded tyres and rims.

A passing motorist called police and videoed crowds of people drinking and casually walking on the 100kmh Tram and Jacksons roads intersection on Saturday, doing burnouts and obscuring the area in clouds of tyre smoke.

Local resident Cameron Barnett said boy racers were an ongoing issue most weekends at intersections in Ohoka, Fernside and Swannanoa. He went to see what was keeping him awake at 2.10am and found ‘‘half the bogan population of Christchurch’’ at the Ohoka crossroad.

His dashboard camera footage shows cars doing large burnouts, crowds of people drinking and standing on the road, and a woman using a megaphone.

At the time, Barnett estimated there were about 50 cars parked on the verge. ‘‘I am just concerned about the drink-driving to be honest. It is only a matter of time before someone gets hit. It is an accident waiting to happen.’’

Residents in an online neighbourhood group had suggested extreme measures to deter boy racers, like firing effluent cannons or ploughing through the crowds with a tractor with a front end loader bucket.

It comes as a Hamilton insomniac fed-up with street racers was sentenced for shooting at their cars. A passing motorist warned racers to ‘‘be safe out there’’.

Barnett said a decoy camera on an 8-metre pole was set up on the Jacksons Rd intersection for about eight months, which was ‘‘enough to be a deterrent’’. But it went missing the afternoon before the gathering. Another local resident was so intimidated by the increasing ‘‘pack mob behaviour’’ he did not want to be named.

‘‘You can set your clock by it, usually at 2.15am. You get sick of getting woken up.’’

Residents regularly had to clean up alcohol cans and bottles, takeaway rubbish, and destroyed car rims and tyres.

He was also concerned a cigarette butt might start a fire on the dry grass verges.

A group of boy racers caused havoc for locals on the corner of Tram and Jacksons roads in Ohoka on Saturday night, doing burnouts and drinking alcohol.