RESIDENTS across Dorset are set to learn which spots have been earmarked as potential authorised sites for travellers.

Nine local councils in Dorset banded together three years ago to spend an estimated £250,000 on tackling the controversial issue by hiring private consultants to look at potential sites.

Baker Associates has now reported back and its findings will become public in the next days or weeks.

The locations of the first suggested sites, for West Dorset, will be made public today. Senior councillors in Poole already know of its suggested sites, which should be made public within the next week.

A full public consultation is due to begin across the county in November. Meanwhile, the councils are waiting to hear whether the government will remove the legal requirement for them to find a set number of authorised pitches for travellers.

Cllr Mike White, cabinet member for planning at the Borough of Poole, said: “What we’re looking at is a consultant’s report that will go to our economy overview group on October 3 and goes on with re commendations from there to cabinet a week or so later. As it goes through the process, we’ll give full consideration to the consultant’s report. I wouldn’t rule anything in or out.”

Bournemouth has previously protested that it does not have any sites for travellers which are acceptable to the public.

Sites which have been proposed and then abandoned in recent years included Milhams in the north of the town; a location near the Cherry Tree Nursery at Northbourne; land off the Wessex Way at Riverside Avenue; and another site near the Wessex Way at Cambridge Road.

A protest in Poole saw off plans for a site at Merley Hall Farm, in the green belt at Ashington, as well as a tourist car park at Branksome.

The previous government’s Regional Spatial Strategy required councils to find a set number of pitches for travellers by 2011 – in Poole’s case, 35 residential pitches and eight transit pitches. But the spatial strategies were suspended by the coalition government pending the publication of its Localism Bill in the autumn.

The county’s development plan aims to allocate permanent and transit sites for gypsies, travellers and travelling show people across Dorset for the next 15 years.

The government says councils will be responsible for assessing and meeting the needs of their communities, including traveller site provision.

Comments are closed on this story but we'd still like to hear what you have to say. Email newsdesk@bournemouthecho.co.uk