AN HISTORIC ceremony marked the end of an era and the start of a new one for a Bovey Tracey water treatment works.

The completion of a £4million installation scheme at Tottiford Water Treatment Works means the daily manual washing of the site's pressure filters will come to and end after 100 years.

Tottiford Water Treatment Works supplies water for more than 70,000 properties in South Devon including Torquay, Paignton, Newton Abbot, Kingskerswell, Teignmouth, Dawlish and Chudleigh.

Every day for the last century an operator at the works has washed the 16 filters.

Five new rapid state-of-the-art gravity filters have been installed to replace the older filters, some of which date back to 1912.

The new equipment will maintain the high standards of drinking water produced at the works.

It means one less job for South West Water's water treatment technician Kevin Jones and his colleagues.

Kevin, who has worked for South West Water for 36 years and spent 20 years of his career with the company at Tottiford, ceremonially washed the old filters for the last time.

Programme manager Robert Prentice said: "This is a major investment which will maintain the high quality of drinking water for our customers in South Devon."