Drivers using a residential street as a rat run regularly break the speed limit and are putting lives at risk, it is claimed.

Priory Avenue in Chingford is used as a shortcut to the North Circular and residents are calling for action to improve safety before there is a serious accident.

Carole Pridmore, 52, has started a campaign for traffic calming measures in the road, after her cat, Connie, was hit by a car seven weeks ago and has warned someone may get hurt.

Connie survived but Mrs Pridmore says dozens of cats have been killed by motorists in recent years and she lost a cat seven years ago.

More than 80 people living in the street have signed a petition calling on the council to install speed bumps.

Mrs Pridmore said: “If we counted up the number of cats killed down this road it would be in the twenties.”

“It worries me. There are families with young children here. It’ll be a child one day.”

Mrs Pridmore claims that every resident on the street has had some damage done to their vehicles as drivers struggle to pass each another at rush hour.

She said: “One resident had a car land in their garden on top of their own car after a bad crash.

“That’s how bad it is down here.”

The road, which runs between Chingford Mount cemetery and Waltham Way, has a 30mph speed limit but Mrs Pridmore says this is regularly ignored, so is unimpressed with the council’s suggestion to extend a 20mph speed limit throughout the borough.

“It won’t make any difference. They’re already breaking the speed limit,” said Mrs Pridmore.

Councillor Clyde Loakes, deputy leader and cabinet member for environment, said: “We will be carrying out some speed monitoring in Priory Avenue over the coming months and this will help inform what action we take on the road as we look to extend 20mph zones throughout the borough.

“Where issues such as rat-running have been identified we have put forward traffic calming measures such as speed humps. We will be looking to continue to roll this out across the middle and north of the borough over the next couple of years.”

The group of residents have just set up a website and a facebook campaign and intend to start an online petition.