Lack of funds is being blamed for a lack of street lighting in a narrow Dawlish lane.
Residents in Elmwood Crescent, hit by a spate of burglaries, have signed a petition which Teignbridge MP Richard Younger-Ross presented to Devon County Council.
Organiser Vivienne Crellin has been asking for street lighting since August 2001, but says the buck was passed back and forth at county hall for months.
Then she was told there was no money for any scheme.
Mrs Crellin, who has lived in Elmwood Crescent for 20 years and is pictured left with her petition, said the Crescent was used as a short cut by people living in the Kingsdown Crescent area.
It was particularly bad at night, and at least one partially-sighted neighbour was too frightened to use the lane at night.
Both cyclists and walkers used it, she said, and in any case it was full of potholes and really too dangerous to use after dark.
'We had one or two nasty incidents which really led to me getting up the petition and I could get twice as many signatures if I thought it was necessary.
'I don't like walking down there at night and if anyone was lurking down there you wouldn't see them because of the hedges,' she stressed.