Drunken students keeping elderly residents awake shouting and singing outside their homes are having their booze-fuelled actions caught on camera, say police.

Ever since term started, residents living close to the University campus and in the Garden Quarter have suffered from sleepless nights as students walk home from their nights out in the city centre.

Now, as elderly residents living in Sarl Williams Court have their double glazing installation brought forward by five years due to anti-social behaviour, police say they have taken extra measures to stop the nuisance threat.

On Monday and Wednesday nights, police are placing officers outside sheltered housing on Garden Lane, as well as parking up the council’s CCTV close to the 33 flats, so they can 'monitor students coming and going' and identify prolific troublemakers.

Chester Students Union, meanwhile, has been diverting students away from their normal route to town, in an attempt to stop them waking residents who live in Sarl Williams and Homedee House.

Police sergeant for the Garden Quarter area Andy Burrage reassured residents living in the area that they had not been abandoned by police.

He said: “We take a realistic approach that students will make noise as they are coming home from a night out, but we have to make a judgment about when it becomes a criminal matter.”

President of Chester Students’ Union, Katie Badman, said she had been in meetings with managers of Sarl Williams Court, and was hoping to arrange “befriending” sessions between students and elderly residents living there.

She said: “It is a very small minority of students causing the problems, the vast majority are working really hard to study at a university they love, in a city they love.”

Keith Barnett, locality manager for Housing 21, which manages Sarl Williams Court, confirmed the double glazing had been brought forward from 2019.

He added: “We are aware that residents at Sarl Williams Court have been troubled by noise and anti-social behaviour and have been working closely with the local police, community support officers, the university and the students union on this issue.

“We have decided to bring forward the planned installation of double glazing in the hope this will bring about some improvement.”