BBC Essex veteran Steve Scruton will wave an emotional farewell to the station he has served for 24 years on New Year's Eve.
The 61-year-old, of Colchester, who started his career as a volunteer at Hospital Radio Chelmsford, has decided to take a redundancy package as part of the Chelmsford-based station's restructure.
Mr Scruton, who has being doing his weekday 2-4pm slot for 22 years of his time at the station, said: "I'm extremely happy because the BBC had to make some cuts and I was aware some time ago that there were going to be redundancies, so at my time of life and with my long service record I was thinking I could be considered.
"So I put my name forward which got an instant 'No you can't go, you're part of the backbone of the station', but I made it clear that I really wanted to have a rest.
"I don't want to close the door on broadcasting completely, I want to use it as an opportunity to recharge my batteries and, if there's an opportunity for me to come back in the future, then the station will consider me."