The new compact edition of the Evening Press hit the streets of York for the first time yesterday.

Reader Fiona Baxter was on hand to set the presses rolling on an historic new era for the paper after winning its competition, and York town cryer John Redpath toured the city announcing the news of the new format.

Celebrities such as BBC Look North presenter Harry Gration, York panto dame and TV personality Berwick Kaler and York City player manager Chris Brass also marked the day by signing first edition copies of the new newspaper.

And 400 staff at the paper's Walmgate HQ joined in the celebrations with the cutting of a giant, decorated cake.

The move to compact six nights a week is what readers and advertisers have been asking for since the paper first experimented successfully with a tabloid Saturday edition in 1997.

The decision follows extensive research by the paper - including an in-paper survey of readers, a non-reader poll, focus-group sessions and a survey of retail advertisers and newsagents - which all showed people were overwhelmingly in favour of the new format.

Editor Kevin Booth: "I believe our move to a new compact format is one of the most significant developments in the long and distinguished history of the Evening Press.

"It's a brand-new era and we have an exciting future. We have a great new newspaper and now we await the reactions of the readers and advertisers.

"I am confident that most people will like it and we have an opportunity to attract new readers who were not interested in a broadsheet. It's what they asked for and I think we have got the formula right."

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