Red telephone boxes saved for posterity (From Herald Series)

Red telephone boxes saved for posterity

5:52pm Friday 4th December 2009

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ELEVEN parish councils in the county have stepped in to save their village’s red telephone boxes, but dozens more are set to disappear from the landscape.

South Oxfordshire District Council asked 36 town and parish councils whether they wanted to adopt their iconic K6 model telephone boxes for £1.

Phone lines would be removed, but the familiar red and glass shells – designed in 1935 by the architect of, among many other notable buildings, the New Bodleian Library in Oxford, Giles Gilbert Scott – would remain.

Parish councils have now stepped in to save 13 out of 47 boxes. A further nine are listed, so cannot be removed, but the future is now uncertain for the other 26.

Some have been only used for a single phone call in the last year.

BT is refusing to maintain telephone connections because they are underused, and it will not let anyone except councils take over their ownership.

In the village of West Hagbourne, parish councillors want villagers to suggest how to use the kiosk.

Parish council clerk Dave Totterdell said: “It is an iconic image. Obviously, some villagers are upset that the phone is being removed out of the kiosk, but it’s something that the parish council cannot afford to maintain.”

Now the council wants villagers to suggest how it could be used, after reports the village of Westbury-sub-Mendip, in Somerset, had converted its box into the country’s smallest library.

Parish councillor Sue Totterdell said: “We’re open to any suggestions. I think I would favour using it as a small conservatory, but if anyone comes up with any ideas, we’re happy to hear them.”

lsloan@oxfordmail.co.uk

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