POLICE bosses at Eastern Division were finally handed the keys to their new headquarters this week, ready to move in the next few months.

The £5.6million station will be the nerve centre for all of East Lancashire's police operations and equipped with the latest technology.

It is eerily silent now and the smell of fresh paint still hangs heavy in the air.

Workmen are busy putting the finishing touches to the building, which will be the base for Eastern Division when the crumbling Victorian Northgate base finally closes its doors.

In a few months that silence will be broken as the first of the 415 staff move in.

The new building stands three-storeys high on the Greenbank Business Park, at Blackburn's Whitebirk Industrial Estate.

Along with a "walk-in" station, currently being built at Blackburn Railway Station, the new building is part of an £8million scheme to modernise policing for the area.

More than four years in the planning, Greenbank -- as it is to be called -- features a number of firsts for the county.

Its purpose-built custody suite is the largest in the country and will take in prisoners from Accrington, Darwen, Great Harwood, Clitheroe and Longridge, as well as Blackburn.

It is the first in Lancashire to feature a secure van docking bay, for those prisoners who refuse to come quietly, as well as being the first to use civilian custody staff. And with 44 cells shared across eight wings, the suite is more than capable of coping with the demands that an average of 12,000 prisoners each year brings.

Each cell is designed to comply with Home Office regulations -- including low beds for drunken prisoners who may be prone to falling out of bed.

There are also two observational cells where prisoners can be monitored round the clock through windows to ensure they don't harm themselves.

Greenbank was built to accommodate the ever-growing departments of Eastern Division's police.

The introduction of centralised communications centres throughout Lancashire Police meant an extra 70 staff was crammed into Northgate.

The move forced the Criminal Justice Support Department out of Northgate -- which will eventually be sold off -- and into an office above Lord Street to allow for the new call centre.

Greenbank will see all departments back together under one roof -- to the benefit of the public.

The vast communications room at Greenbank has more workstations than its Northgate counterpart. According to Inspector Whittle, team manager for the Greenbank project, that means calls from the public should be answered much more promptly.

He said: "The new headquarters as a whole will improve our service. It is about bringing policing in East Lancashire into the 21st century and everyone will benefit."