Shocking images show an “alleyway from hell” filled with hypodermic needles just metres from a busy path.

The drugs den situated in Folkestone town centre contains a sea of syringes, illicit paraphernalia and, bizarrely, children’s toys.

KentOnline reported on the danger site in 2017, prompting the district council to clear up the waste – but the problem is said to have become “so much worse”.

A street cleaning charity refuses to enter the abandoned alley, metres from where the former Precious Times nursery was, in Cheriton Road.

Town Sprucer Peter Phillips said: “It’s getting too bad for us. It’s too dangerous – I won’t send any teams down here.

“It’s the alleyway from hell. To think this goes on in this day and age, so close to where children pass, is absolutely madness.

“It has been like this for about six years now – it’s the kind of thing you’d expect to see in the Bronx in the 80s.

“You can easily get down here. You just walk a few metres down the ramp and you’re in one of the most vile places imaginable.

“A child could just drop their ball, it would roll down the ramp into the drug den, and then they would get spiked by a needle.”

Folkestone has recently featured heavily in the national media, often depicted as a well-heeled, almost glamorous town – even being described as “the new Brighton”.

But thousands of visitors each summer walking daily from Folkestone Central Station to the harbour would be unaware of the devastation just metres away.

Left abandoned, the route previously formed an underpass helping pedestrians safely cross from Middleburg Square to a car park, now an Asda supermarket.

But once the walkway was blocked almost two decades ago, it was transformed into a drug den.

Easily accessible by a short disability ramp outside an old children’s nursery, the hole is about 15 metres long and three metres wide.

More than 70 discarded syringes were seen on the floor when KentOnline’s reporter visited on Friday.

Describing his surroundings from inside the den, Mr Phillips said: “Dog baskets full of wiring, cassette cases… kids toys, plastic, and lots and lots of needles.

“We have needles, some packaging of needles there, this is full of all sorts of needles, where they’re dumped, it’s just everywhere.”

Asked what advice he would give to those who inadvertently walked into the den, Mr Phillips said: “Escape as quickly as you can.”

KentOnline first reported on the dangerous state of the subway in 2017.

The harrowing pictures prompted Folkestone and Hythe District Council to deploy specialists who swept away a sea of 60 syringes and other drugs paraphanalia.

But today an almost unimanagable squalor has built up, where needles, tournequets, sleeping bags, smashed glass and burnt tin foil lay among the waste.

Mr Phillips said the scene makes him feel saddened and the rubbish is some of the worst he has seen.

“I believe this subway was built originally to help keep people who were crossing the road safe,” he said.

“But now it’s pointless and too dangerous to even go down.”

A Folkestone and Hythe District Council spokesman said it will soon clear the mess.