ABOUT Cheshire East and West there are 43 BT phone booths available for community adoption for £ 1.
The iconic phone booths can be taken over by the communities through BT’s Adopt a Kiosk program and then converted into anything from defibrillator units and mini-history museums to art galleries and book exchanges.
BT will also consider adoption requests to place defibrillators in modern glass phone booths, a potentially life-saving move.
There are currently 27 phone booths in Cheshire West and Chester and 16 in Cheshire East.
Sarah Walker, BT Enterprise’s Head of Unit for the North of England said: “With most people now using cell phones, this has resulted in a huge drop in the number of calls made from payphones.
“At the same time, cellular coverage has improved significantly in recent years due to investments in masts, especially in rural areas.
“We are currently streamlining our payphone property to make it fit for the future, and the ‘Adopt a Kiosk’ program is allowing local communities in the Northwest to keep their local phone booth with a refreshing purpose for the community.
“Thousands of communities have already come up with a fantastic range of ideas for reusing their beloved phone booth.
“The application is quick and easy and we are always happy to speak to the communities about the introduction of our telephone booths.”
Municipalities can introduce a kiosk if they are a recognized public body – for example a municipal council, a municipal council or a city council.
Boxes can also be adopted by registered charities or by people who have a payphone on their own land.
BT will continue to supply electricity free of charge (if already available) to power the lights for accepted telephone booths.
Further information is available at www.bt.com/adopt.
