Ipswich police station set to be demolished during the summer
Ipswich Police Station - Credit: Paul Geater
Work to demolish Ipswich’s former main police station is set to get underway at the end of June.
The borough council’s executive is today set to approve the demolition of the Elm Street building – bringing down a building that was opened in the late 1960s.
The police moved out of most of the building in September 2012 when most of its work transferred to Landmark House on the north-west edge of Ipswich.
A few rooms on the ground floor remained open until the new police station opened on Museum Street last summer.
When the police moved out the building was sold back to the borough council, which had originally built it in the 1960s – however it was always known it would not have a long-term future.
A key reason for the police decision to move out was the need to carry out significant repairs and maintenance to the building. It is suffering from a form of concrete cancer.
The borough’s executive will hear tonight that it is not economic to repair the building and there is no prospect of any developer wanting to buy it and convert it into modern offices.
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It would be uneconomic to find a short-term tenant because the council would need to carry out expensive maintenance. Demolishing the building will also save the borough £100,000 a year in business rates.
Council leader David Ellesmere said: “There really is no alternative. The building is life-expired. That’s the reason the police were keen to move out in the first place.”
No decision has yet been taken on what will happen to the site of the building, although the borough is talking to the owners of the neighbouring former Civic Centre site about possibly including it in a major redevelopment project.
