Yes, there is, actually. You will need to use the XF86_FBdev driver if for some reason your current X11 driver doesn't like vesafb. Go to http://www.xfree86.org, and download the X332servonly.tgz archive, unpack, configure it by editing xc/config/cf/xf86site.def, and uncomment the #define for XF68FBDevServer. Don't worry about the m68k reference, it supports Intel platforms. Then build the whole thing - it'll take a long time though as it's a large source tree.
There is as of yet, no pre-compiled XF86_FBdev binary available, but I understand that Debian may be working on this; and they will be able to produce both libc5/glibc2 variants.
There have been reports that X11 is non functional on certain graphic cards with this vesafb feature enabled, if this is happening, try the new XF86_FBdev driver for X11.
This driver, along with vesafb can also help run X11 in higher graphic resolutions with certain graphic chipsets which are not supported by any of the current X11 drivers. Examples are MGA G-200 et. al.
Hopefully the X11 problems with supported graphic cards will be fixed in future releases.