Up to 27 more potential pitches for gipsies have been included in a major exercise to create extra accommodation for traveller families in South Gloucestershire.

The district is under orders to provide a total of 53 new residential and 25 transit pitches by 2011 on top of sites already in use.

Last year it drew up a list of 17 sites where those pitches could potentially be created.

South Gloucestershire Council said it hoped to find room for some of the extra pitches by intensifying the use of existing camps.

But new land is also being considered, with some areas near current sites and some in completely new locations.

A consultation process to ask for people's views on the land identified resulted in landowners putting forward their own suggestions.

Most involve private land already used by travellers who want to add more pitches to the sites.

They include Moor Paddock in Westerleigh Road, Westerleigh, where an extra three residential pitches and one transit pitch are proposed by the owners.

One further pitch is suggested at each of three sites in Ram Hill, Coalpit Heath, at The Meadows, Parkfield, Pucklechurch, and at Giddy End, High Lane, Winterbourne. A further one or two pitches were put forward for land at Parkfield Road, Pucklechurch.

Two new sites have been added to the list of possible locations at Little Acre, Dyers Lane, Iron Acton and on land at Tanhouse Lane, Yate.

The proposals now received have given the council a bigger pool of options from which to find the best sites.

But it has stressed they are only suggestions at this stage, along with those included in the initial consultation.

All English councils are under pressure to assess accommodation needs for gipsies and tell the Government how they intend to meet them.

South Gloucestershire has been directed to prepare a new plan to allocate sites as a matter of urgency. A recent independent report also recommended more sites in the district.

The council already has two official sites in Highwood Lane, Patchway, and in Old Gloucester Road, Winterbourne.

Peter Jackson, the council's director of planning, transport and the environment, said: "We haven't taken any view on these extra proposed sites. Some may be acceptable, some may not but we wanted to give details of them so local residents were aware they had been put forward."

Mr Jackson said people who wanted to comment on the new sites should do so by July 13 so the council could assess them to see if they should be included in a document being produced for the next stage of the process. There will then be further consultation in the autumn.

If the council does not take action to meet the demands from the Government, it risks having sites forced on them.

Sites already being considered for an intensification of use are in Bank Road, Pilning; Bristol Road, Frampton Cotterell; Henfield Road, Coalpit Heath; Gloucester Road, Almondsbury; Berwick Lane, Easter Compton; Badminton Road, Nibley, near Yate, and two in Westerleigh Road, Westerleigh. Sites near existing camps are in Bank Road, Pilning, and next to Northwood Park, Winterbourne.

New locations are in Hall End Lane, between Wickwar and Rangeworthy; Wyckbeck Road, Patchway; Kendall Close, Yate; Sandy Lane, Aust; Curtis Lane, Stoke Gifford; Northwick Road, Pilning, and east of Mulgrove Farm, near Old Gloucester Road, Winterbourne.