£3.36 million Devonport police station opens (From This is The West Country)

£3.36 million Devonport police station opens

9:37am Wednesday 31st October 2012 in Devon

The new £3.36 million Devonport police station has opened six years after it was given the green light.

The station will house over 140 Devon and Cornwall police staff and replaces "disjointed" offices on Marlborough Street.

It will only be open to the public by appointment and has no enquiry office.

Officers from neighbourhood policing, response and local investigation will make up a 147 strong workforce at the new three storey station, which is one of the ‘greenest’ in the Force estate.

After delays in identifying a suitable site it took until May 2011 for the sale and planning to go through and main contractor Midas actually started work in October with a 52 week build programme.

Like much of Plymouth Devonport suffered heavy bombing during World War II and the new building’s concrete foundations had to be adjusted to take into account huge underground voids.

Fortunately, no bombs were found and despite the delay Midas will hand over the building on time and within both build and overall budget.

It was 2006 when the police authority signalled a move from what had become unsuitable premises in Marlborough Street.

The existing station at Marlborough Street was originally an old bank, constructed in the mid 1950’s and bought by the authority in 1997 to house Devonport’s officers.

Originally it was intended to house only the local police patrol officers but numbers increased and, until recently, many were forced to work from four temporary buildings housed in the car park.

“Marlborough Street just wasn’t fit for purpose,” said Plymouth’s local policing Chief Inspector, Ian Drummond-Smith, who will move out of Marlborough Street and into the new building. “It provided us with poor quality and disjointed accommodation.

“The officers at Devonport have waited a long time for the new station, which will be in the heart of their policing community and offer a much better standard of accommodation. This project offers a fantastic long term investment in policing the Devonport area.”