Newbury’s commercial radio station Kick FM has lost 10% of its listeners in the last three months, new industry figures show.

The Bone Lane station’s audience has dwindled from a high of 22,000 when it launched in 2001 to just 18,000 in June this year – its lowest yet. Similarly, the average time spent listening to the station fell from 7.5 hours to just 5.6 hours.

Similarly, BBC Radio Berkshire lost nearly one in eight of its listeners between 2001 and June 2005, while 2TEN bucked the trend by reporting the same audience as four years ago.

The gloomy outlook for local radio stations comes amid a surge in popularity for local news websites, of which newbury.net has the largest following. It also mirrors a switch-off of radio shows across the country, where almost four million listeners have ‘disappeared’ over the four years.