Residents and guest house owners in Warwick have called for the half-demolished Banana Beach and Flamingo Beach properties to be torn down because they are an eyesore and a danger to children.

They say they have complained for years that the empty former hotels, which have been closed for more than a decade, have been used by prostitutes and drug dealers, and they have demanded the American owners take action.

Two weeks ago, law firm Appleby, Spurling and Kempe, which is agent for the American owners, secured an eviction of the illegal occupants and ordered that holes be punched in the roofs to make them uninhabitable.

But the buildings have been half-demolished and frustrated locals on South Shore, Warwick, say the site looks like a disaster zone.

Warwick East MP Dale Butler, who has backed the residents, said the owners, who are understood to be planning to visit the site in the coming weeks, should pull down the rest of the buildings.

The site has been derelict since the hotels closed, one in 1998 and one in 1990, when the land was earmarked to be turned into a Ritz-Carlton hotel.

But the project was paralysed in 1991 when the Japanese backers of the project pulled out due to the collapse of the Japanese financial markets.

Lynn Rayner, the manager of Sandpiper Apartments, which is across the road from the site on the South Shore, said the buildings needed to be completely knocked down.

"There has been a lot of illegal activity, drugs, prostitution and people residing there and we've been on to MPs, AS&K, planning, tourism and the Police," she told The Royal Gazette yesterday.

"There's ourselves across the road and Surfside next door and it's affecting our business because guests are lying by the pool and they can see cars going up all the time to derelict buildings.

"We've had break-ins and there's rats over there which have come over when they smell food cooking here.

"Two weeks ago D&J Construction half knocked it down and now it is totally disgusting and unsightly, half up and half down, and it actually looks worse that it was before.

"Two weeks ago the Police and the bailiffs came and the people were removed and it was half knocked down, because that was the instruction, to make it uninhabitable, but now it's awful.

"We're trying to do something about tourism and we have to deal with this. We're happy they're doing something, but they can't leave it like this.

"Now it's even more dangerous and you could get kids going in there and have a wall fall on top of them. They should just knock it down now. I'm not asking them to turn it into a park."

Director of Planning, Rudolph Hollis, said yesterday that planning permission was not needed for demolition unless it involves a listed building or one which is set back a certain distance from the road.

A building control officer was visiting the site yesterday to determine if it was in a dangerous condition. If it is deemed to be unsafe, planning can force the owners to make the site safe.

Mr. Hollis said his department was still trying to find out the name of the owners to contact them.

"When I went by there I could confirm it had been partially demolished. The building control officer is trying to find out who the owner is and to find out if what is left is safe. If we can determine who is responsible, then the onus will be on them to confirm if it is safe," he said.

Mr. Butler said yesterday: "It is unfortunate that for whatever reason, the holes were not just punched in the roof, so now it is a real eyesore.

"And with guest houses there and the tourism season just around the corner, it doesn't look good. Something has to be done, and someone has to come in, knock it down and truck the material away."

Kelvin Hastings-Smith of Appleby, Spurling and Kempe, said yesterday: "I regret that I am unable to discuss the matter at this time."