It is the end of an era for Burnham as a fisheries laboratory building is being torn down to make way for houses.

Work has begun on the demolition of the Cefas (Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Agriculture Science) building in Remembrance Avenue, seven years after it announced its closure.

Sixty years after it first moved to the town, the Cefas building will be razed to the ground for seven townhouses and seven detached homes to be built on the site.

The permission was granted in October on the condition that £45,637 would be given to primary schools in Burnham and there would be a further contribution towards offsite affordable homes in the town.

This week a £1million extension to the building has been carefully taken apart in order to be sent to Africa.

Russell Forde, director of agents Smart Planning, said: “The building is in two parts, there’s a 1950s part, which is the original laboratories and there was a modern extension built in 2005.

“The extension is being carefully dismantled and photographed and it will be put in a container and donated to be used as a school in Africa."

See this week's MBS for the full story.