Okay, so it's a typical BT telephone box - except it isn't, it's a Very Important BT Box.
This is the telephone box at Kilmory on West Ardnamurchan's lovely north shore. Given the option, BT would like to get rid of it as it's miles off their beaten track and repairs and maintenance are costly - witness its rather faded paint. But Kilmory's telephone box isn't like your average high street telephone box, or a box in a leafy suburb. If those go, people can always use a mobile phone. It isn't like that in Kilmory. Kilmory needs that box.
Most visitors come to Ardnamurchan expecting their mobile will work. Some networks, such as T Mobile, have no coverage here at all. Even for those that do, the coverage is patchy, and the north coast is particularly bad. VHF reception is also poor, so Channel 16, the maritime emergency channel, doesn't always work offshore.
The problem with the Kilmory box is that it no longer takes coins, but BT have been slow to put in a proper notice to explain how it works without coins. Residents of Kilmory who have a land line have found visitors with sick children knocking on their doors in the middle of the night asking to use a 'phone.
Recently, the box stopped working altogether. The battle was taken up by West Ardnamurchan Community Council, that wonderful democratic body that is so active in this area, which managed both to make sure that the box worked and that BT installed a proper set of instructions.
There are times when living in such a remote area is a struggle, and sometimes that struggle is to retain things which would seem almost irrelevant anywhere else. It's not that we are living in a different time-warp, it's just that the perks of modern life can't always be taken for granted.
I agree that these boxes are vital in such a rural area. I remember signing a petition at Portuairk to keep the box there. On a cautionary note while staying a Rudh Dubh we walked over to use the phone box only to find by the time we got back the tide had come in and we were forced to wade across the river, towing a reluctant 3 legged dog who refused to jump.
ReplyDeletei will sign your petition i am on holiday in november and may need to use it if the signals are so bad
ReplyDeleteregards
chris w
west yorks
If the box is that difficult for BT to maintain, is there not a case to attempt to persuade the company to hand over the routine maintenance (painting/cleaning/sanitising etc) to somebody local on a retainer basis? I'm not sure how amenable BT would be to this in these days of public liability insurance and writ hungry lawyers and obviously they would need to retain responsibility for actual repairs, but it would seem to be in tune with the whole "big society" thing which our new Westminster overlords are urging us to adopt.
ReplyDeleteAnd if BT will not see sense on the issue, perhaps an approach to your local neo-tory overlord, Mr Kennedy might prove fruitful?