AN elderly Crediton woman who has just had heart surgery says lorries driving over potholes on Exhibition Road are keeping her and her husband awake at night. 

Carol Fletcher, 75, told the Courier a traffic calming island forces large vehicles to drive over a series of patched and open potholes on the A3072 next to her home on Blagdon Rise. 

“They can't avoid it,” she said.  

“If a lorry comes down it's like a low rumble of thunder. And a lorry with an empty trailer on the back – we've measured it – is over 95 decibels. 

“There's one, two, three potholes that need doing, and where these have all been done, they're just different heights.  

“They only last a few weeks, and they have to come back and do them again.” 

Mr and Mrs Fletcher have been given a brief respite thanks to the current closure of Exhibition Road due to roadworks. 

But when traffic uses the road normally, she said they are kept awake until late and woken early in the morning. 

“We're not getting any sleep until gone 11pm,” she said, pointing to her bedroom window across the road. 

“Then it starts sort of 5am, 5.30am in the morning. When they start doing the harvesting it's virtually all night. 

“If you can imagine a lorry, an eight-wheeled lorry, plus a trailer on the back. It's worse when the trailers are empty. 

“It doesn't affect us so much during the day. Our lounge is there, so we can hear the noise above our television.

“I needed [sleep] before [my heart operation], it didn't help that I wasn't getting much sleep. You get a couple of hours here and a couple of hours there.”

Mrs Fletcher first started complaining to Devon County Council in February 2023 and has contacted her county councillor and MP for help to solve the issue. 

“I'd like that bit of road completely resurfaced and the island taken away, because the same thing's going to happen,” she added. 

A Devon County Council spokesperson said in response: “We are looking to carry out patching work along this road as soon as we are able.”