RESIDENTS in a York street which has been flooded by a burst pipe have claimed water bosses should have fixed the problem sooner.

The leak occurred last Wednesday and has been soaking Woodlea Avenue, in Acomb ever since.

Yorkshire Water repair teams struggled to get to the scene because of the additional pressures caused by the sub-zero temperatures.

But people living in the street are angry at the delay in fixing the pipe and say it should have been made a higher priority after the water led to the area outside their houses becoming dangerous for motorists, cyclists and pedestrians.

Les Precious, 54, who has lived in Woodlea Avenue for 27 years, said: “I saw the leak on Wednesday and since then it has covered the road from one side to the other. The water has been coming up from a dropped kerb near a driveway and has frozen, meaning the road has been really perilous and cyclists and people walking along have been struggling.

“This is dangerous and we should have had a much quicker response from Yorkshire Water. I can appreciate they are hard-pressed at the moment, but this is something which needed to be sorted out much quicker.”

A spokesman for Yorkshire Water, which on Christmas Eve was dealing with about 200 leaks across the region, thanked residents for alerting them and said they had identified a small burst in a four-inch pipe.

“We are working as hard as we possibly can to get to it and to get it repaired,” he said.

“This is an incredibly busy period for us, but we want to reassure customers in this area that we will get to it as quickly as possible and carry out the repair.”

Meanwhile, John Wilkinson, who lives in nearby Chestnut Grove with his wife, Louise, and their two young daughters, said their home was one of four on the street which was left without water for several days before Christmas, meaning they had to shower at their workplaces and stock up on bottled water for drinking.

“There’s no mains water at all,” said the 37-year-old finance manager.

“I rang Yorkshire Water, but their line is that it’s most likely frozen at the house end. I just hope nothing is damaged when it does thaw.” Mr Precious said on Boxing Day: “The leak still hasn’t been fixed. We’ve still got water, but it’s still running past our house on the road.

“There’s a quarter of a mile stretch of road that is getting more and more dangerous by the hour.”