WORK has begun to demolish the remainder of the former police station in Bradford which will clear the way for a new business district in the city centre.
Machinery has been brought on to The Tyrls site on the edge of City Park and workers have begun breaking through from the Prince's Way side of the building to the centre courtyard in the first stage of the process.
Next they will begin to remove the building floor by floor from the inside out.
Once the site has been cleared - with work expected to last until mid July - outline plans are already in place for three new office blocks of between three and five storeys.
The office blocks, called One City Park, Two City Park and Three City Park, aim to provide 93,000 sq ft of grade A office space, enough to house 700 employees.
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The Tyrls building has been empty since 2007, having been used for three decades before Bradford South Police relocated to Trafalgar House, in Nelson Street.
It was partly demolished in 2010 as City Park was being built, due to the continued need to use the cells which are connected to the magistrates' court by an underground tunnel.
Now new magistrates' court cells, which are part of the £4.5 million project to free up the key city centre site for redevelopment, have opened, it allows the remainder of The Tyrls to go.
The work to build the new cells as well as demolish the remainder of the former police station and clear the site for redevelopment is expected to cost £4.5 million, with £2.2m of this being met by the Homes and Communities Agency.
The remaining £2.3 million is being paid for with cash secured by Bradford Council from the Regional Growth Fund.
Permission was granted in December for the remaining half of the old Tyrls police station to be demolished, along with outline approval for the three new office blocks.
A spokesman for Council said the demolition work will take place between the hours of 8am and 5pm and no road closures are necessary. The authority also confirmed that ISG Construction, which has a Bradford office near Chain Bar, was the contractors undertaking the work.
The spokesman added: "The contractors are breaking through to the centre courtyard first and then the building will be demolished on a tiered basis from the inside to the outside."
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