WORK has recommenced to demolish the former Bury Police Station three years after it initially started.

Demolition of the former headquarters in Irwell Street began in early 2015, but halted shortly afterwards.

But, work to clear the site started again on Monday after Bury Council appointed a new company, P McGuinness and Company, to carry out the work.

It is hoped that the work will be completed by April 23.

Lower Bank Street will be closed until March 26 to allow the demolition to take place.

The council say that access to properties and Castle Leisure Centre will be maintained while the work is being carried out.

The leisure centre car park will also remain open, however, while Lower Bank Street is shut, access will be via the old police station car park at the bottom of Irwell Street.

The former police station has stood empty since 2010, when the force left Irwell Street for a new £16 million base in Castlecroft Road.

Bury Council owns the site and received permission from its own planning department in 2013 to demolish the building over a six-month period in the first half of 2015 and wrote to neighbours with details of those plans, but the work was later delayed.

The council had intended to sell it to a supermarket firm for a store to be built on the site as part of plans to redevelop the area of the town centre between Bolton Street and Jubilee Way.

However, the deal fell through in January 2015 when the supermarket chain "suddenly decided to scale back its expansion plans," according to council officials.

A council spokesperson told the Bury Times that there were no plans in place for the site once the demolition work is complete.