FAMILIES are today celebrating a dramatic victory in their battle to scrap a Weymouth diversion which would have sent thousands of vehicles past their homes.

Wessex Water has been under fire for months after work to install a new water main under Dorchester Road between Springfield and Manor Roundabout created massive traffic problems.

The council held talks with Wessex about how works could be speeded up, but an idea to divert southbound traffic down Lancaster Road and Greenway Road - which Wessex said could have shaved up to six weeks off their Easter completion date - provoked a storm of protest among residents.

They took their fight to yesterday's Weymouth and Portland planning and traffic committee and won after a dramatic 5-5 tied vote saw the diversion proposal scrapped on chairman Coun Margaret Leicester's casting vote.

Opponents of the diversion were delighted outside the meeting and Greenway Road residents committee chairman John O'Rourke said: "We are absolutely over the moon.

"The decision is common sense, it is right and it preserves children's safety."

Earlier, Weymouth and Portland engineering manager Martyn Gallivan said up to 12,000 extra vehicles a day would use Greenway Road if a diversion was backed.

And he added that there would still be a large number of extra vehicles if there was no diversion because many drivers use the route to bypass roadwork lights.

Wessex Water project manager Steve Dodwell said a diversion would benefit the majority and could cut up to six weeks off the scheme's Easter finish date.

But Mr O'Rourke told the meeting that transport figures suggested that there could be 16 people hurt by the diversion before work finished and he feared that someone could be killed.

Others protested at child safety, noise, pollution and the 'sheer frustration and hell' of having so many vehicles outside their front doors.

Ward councillor Anne Thomas handed in a 75-signature petition from Greenway Road residents, many of whom she said were elderly and faced a serious effect on their quality of life.

Coun John West said a diversion would place 'an intolerable burden' on residents' lives while Coun Peter Farrell said Wessex should just get on and finish the work.

Coun Tina Roebuck said some groups would be upset whatever they decided and she urged colleagues to support the diversion because it could really cut the length of the project.

But the meeting finally opposed the diversion and backed an investigation and talks with residents into an order to stop up Greenway Road for the rest of the works to prevent it being used as a rat run.