AN old telephone kiosk in Bratton will be saved from the bulldozer’s claws and transformed into a feature for the village after the parish council answered calls to ring the changes.
The parish council has agreed to adopt the BT box in Melbourne Street for £1 and earmark £1,000 in next year’s budget on securing its future.
Members previously objected to the removal of the payphone after BT notified Wiltshire Council that it had been identified as one of 34 “very low usage” ones, and Wiltshire Council sent the parish council a consultation.
Reasons given by BT in the consultation for why pinpointed kiosks should not be removed, included the amount of privately rented or council housing in the area, suggesting people on a lower income without access to mobile and fixed telephones, payphones in areas of poor mobile phone coverage, or the call box being near a known accident black-spot.
Cllr Jeff Ligo, Bratton Parish Council chair, said, “In my view it is inevitable that sooner rather than later BT will succeed in its wish to remove the kiosk.
“The loss of the kiosk to the village would be judged by many as unfortunate when there is the opportunity to preserve it by its adoption by the parish council.”
A Stradbrook resident contacted the parish council to propose the phone box be turned into a small retreat and place for reflection, and to provide a seat, books and even refreshments for visitors alongside their home.
Two more local residents said they were interested in giving the phone box a new chapter in its current location, restoring it to former glory and turning it into a book deposit for the village.
Alternatively the kiosk could house a small potted history of Bratton and surrounding area, it was suggested.
Cllr Ligo, seconded by Cllr Ridley, resolved to request that the telephone kiosk be transferred to the parish council as a community asset.
Under the kiosk adoption scheme they are “adopted as seen” and cannot be moved to another location.
A BT spokesperson said, “We occasionally allow modern kiosks to be adopted in rural areas if required for specific purposes (for example to house a defibrillator) where there are no red ones available.
“Since we launched our Adopt a Kiosk scheme, more than 5,000 communities across the UK have seized the opportunity to do something wonderful with local phone boxes that had little or no usage.”