Phone boxes to be saved (From Knutsford Guardian)

Phone boxes to be saved

11:20am Friday 2nd November 2012 in News Exclusive By James Wilson

TOWN councillors have agreed to put money aside to save and restore the town’s red telephone boxes.

Knutsford Town Council adopted two of the old red-style British Telecom telephone boxes in the town in 2008 – one on King Street, near the old Primavera, and the other on Sparrow Lane near the recently-closed Legh Arms.

Councillors voted to spend £600 to maintain the empty boxes at a meeting of the council’s environment committee on Monday evening.

But Clr Tony Dean questioned whether the town should keep them.

“It’s not a lot of money, but they will need looking after,” he said.

“We will need to get the correct red paint, and I think the community should be asked to see if they still want them.”

Clr Andrew Malloy said: “The reason we have kept them is that we are a tourist town, and a lot of people would want to see them and they are part of the town’s heritage.”

Clr Dean said: “But just by using the word ‘heritage’ doesn’t mean they are needed.

“We need to ask people as they don’t have phones in and it seems rather strange to me to keep them.”

Clr Simon Hutchence said he could see where Clr Dean was coming from, but believed the telephone boxes added ‘ambience’ to the town and were part of its heritage.

Clr Bernadette Emmett said the boxes could be transformed into information points or sites for a defibrillator – which has been a common use in other towns and villages across the country.

Councillors voted to retain the boxes and ensure they were maintained in the future.