An iconic red telephone box in Kington will be adopted by the town council - what will the community choose to do with it?

Kington Town Council was asked to consider adopting a redundant phone box on Church Street and to set aside a budget of £500 for it’s refurbishment at a recent meeting.

Town clerk Liz Kelso took members if the town council expressed an interest in taking the phone box on, BT would then sell it to them for £1. If they did not want the power left on they would take that out of it.

Ms Kelso said she had just overseen the refurbishment of a phone box in another parish and they bought a refurbishment kit and it cost about £500.

She said some phone boxes had been used to house defibrillators, as information boards and for tourist leaflets, as plant and seed exchanges or book exchanges but she said it would have to be monitored and managed because there have been cases where inappropriate materials have been left in the boxes.

Members were told in another place vandals got into the book exchange and ripped all the pages out of the books.

Ms Kelso said BT have said they will take the phone away but they can keep the shell but leaving it as a phone is not possible.

Deputy Mayor Councillor Martin Woolford and Councillor Rae Morgan said they thought it was a great idea to adopt the phone box and to consider what could be done with it.

Members aid there is already a defibrillator at the nearby Swan pub and another at the Market Hall.

Since 2008, almost 4,000 communities and charitable bodies have adopted more than 5,800 iconic red kiosks and around 800 of the more modern glass boxes.

People have come up fantastic ideas on how to repurpose them from housing defibrillator to art exhibitions and even a pub.