SOUTHAMPTON'S ambulance station will shut to make way for housing as part of a massive cost-cutting exercise by Hampshire's health chiefs.

The move comes as part of an initiative by the Hampshire Ambulance Service NHS Trust which could see more than a dozen district stations shut around the county.

As reported in the Daily Echo last October, the cutbacks could mean all 19 of Hampshire's ambulance stations are shut down, to be replaced by one central HQ and three large regional depots.

No details of where these four remaining stations would be sited have yet been revealed by the service, though it is thought they would almost certainly be near Hampshire's big cities.

Strategic 'waiting' points would also be brought into play with ambulances holding at key points across the county for calls, probably next to hospital, doctors' surgeries and major built-up areas.

Speaking specifically about the Southampton site, at East Park Terrace, a spokeswoman said the closure of the station was needed because the building was dilapidated and the cost of repair outweighed the benefits of keeping it.

Alison Roughton, head of public relations for the Hampshire Ambulance Service, said: "The ambulance station in Southampton is dilapidated, and is not good enough for our staff and neither is it really big enough for the service's needs any more.

"Many of the primary care trust properties based at the site were built in the 1950s or 60s and the money involved in improvements would not prove cost-effective.

"We have now begun initial consultations with staff and members of the community on the new plans and will continue to do so."

Phil Trevorrow, director of finances for the trust, added that the trust couldn't guarantee that one of the new stations would be in Southampton, though given the excellent road links around the city one would almost certainly be sited close by.

He added that it was also important to remember that most 'on duty' ambulances do not operate from the stations themselves, but wait at strategic locations for calls as they would do under the new plans.

If the proposals go ahead the stations could close as early as 2010, as the trust struggles to claw back a financial deficit that in October last year stood at about £2.7m.

However, ambulance chiefs have also stressed that should the closure programme go ahead it will not affect response times, and that other options are also being considered.

They also insist any profit made from the sale would be ploughed back into other improvements to the service, and that the site would not be sold until any development plans had been finalised.

But the proposals are causing concern among union bosses, who fear support staff for ambulance crews could be cut as part of the cost-cutting exercise, and that staff kept on might have to travel much further to get to work.