WORCESTER'S "new" power station or electricity works on the riverside at Hylton Road was completed at this time a century ago.

It was built to replace the city's first electricity generating station at Powick which had operated for almost a decade from its opening in 1894. The City Council-run Powick plant had been a pacesetter as the first municipal electricity station in Britain.

Berrow's Journal reported in 1903: "The past year has been a very eventful and busy one for the City's Electricity Department and has seen the completion and successful starting of the Hylton Road station and the laying of new low pressure cables.

"We have practically the same number of kilowatts of plant in the new station as at Powick including the Ferranti set.

"The whole of the new plant is working very satisfactorily, and there has not been any serious hitch.

"The whole scheme from beginning to end has been conducted without any addition to the staff, and consequently the work has been very heavy at times, especially when the new station was nearing completion and there were constant tests requiring supervision.

"For some years we were running with a dangerous overload at Powick, and it's heartening that this state of affairs is at an end."