Telephone booth (United Kingdom)
In the United Kingdom were the first telephone booths ( English telephone booth , telephone box ) K1 made of concrete and provided with a wooden door. The British telephone booth is to be distinguished from the police cell .
history
The red telephone booths (type K2), which are so well known today, were designed in 1924 as part of a design competition by the British architect Sir Giles Gilbert Scott for the British postal authority. He won the competition with a classic design with a domed roof , which is based on that of Sir John Soane's mausoleum . The model, which Scott kept in silver, was painted red by the authorities so that the cells could be seen from a distance. The former manufacturing costs were 50 British pounds. The contest had a maximum cost of £ 40. Since the acquisition costs were high and their dimensions were too large for general use (90 cm × 90 cm base with a height of 2.51 m, weight 750 kg), about 1500 pieces were purchased and only installed in London .
In 1929 the British Postal Service approached Scott with the request to design a new model based on the inexpensive and smaller model K1 and the model with the beautiful design K2. The result was the K3 model, 12,000 of which were installed over the next six years.
In 1936 Scott modified the K2 model on the occasion of the silver jubilee of King George V to the K6 model, called the Jubilee Kiosk. However, the king died before seeing a single completed phone booth. By the end of the 1930s, another 20,000 of the type K6 were installed throughout the kingdom. In rural areas, the red color scheme could be different on request. The colors green, yellow, white and gray (battleship gray) could be chosen so as not to disturb the color harmony. The red signal color was intended to promote quick recognition in the cities so that a possible call for help - also from the patrol officers - could be made quickly. In 1939 a Mark II version, improved against vandalism, followed. After Queen Elizabeth II ascended the throne in 1953 , the George crown in the roof of the telephone booth was modified.
The K6 phone booths were manufactured by five different companies: Carron Foundry, Lion Foundry, McDowall Steven, Macfarlane (also known as Saracen Foundry) and Bratt Colbran.
In 1962 a few prototypes of the type K7 were set up and from 1968 the type K8 was added. The latest red telephone booth has a modern design and is made of aluminum instead of iron. The models KX100, KX200, KX300, KX410, KX420, KX plus, KX plus internet and KX520 followed later. All models moved away from the typical red color scheme and box design. In 2007 British Telecom designed a new telephone column, the type ST6, together with JCDecaux. The phone booth consisted of a roofed but otherwise open telephone on one side and an advertising space on the back. The idea was to use the advertising revenue to finance the running costs of the phone. The ST6 was introduced in mid-2007.
In 2002, the UK had over 90,000 phone booths in operation, down from 51,500 in 2012.
In Great Britain, since February 2001, all existing historic telephone booths have been registered as buildings to be protected through a private initiative. The table shows the types of telephone booths recorded so far, their introduction, the designers, their original number of pieces and the number of cell ensembles under monument protection :
| Type | introduction | Designer | Number originally | Number today (under protection) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| K1 | 1920 | Somerville & Company | 6,300 | 5 |
| K2 | 1926 | Sir Giles Gilbert Scott | 1,700 | 208 |
| K3 | 1927 | Sir Giles Gilbert Scott | 12,000 | 2 |
| K4 | 1927 | General Post Office | 50 | 5 |
| K5 | 1934 | General Post Office | no | no |
| K6 | 1936 | Sir Giles Gilbert Scott | 60,000 | 2,072 |
| K7 | 1962 | Neville Conder | 12th | 0 |
| K8 | 1968 | Bruce Martin | 11,000 | 8th |
On behalf of British Telecom (BT) , the partner company X2 Connect sells decommissioned red telephone booths in 2012; the already restored copies cost from 1950 pounds sterling (2300 euros), when the last sale in the mid-1980s (probably 1987) thousands of the phone booths were sold at auction.
Pictures of phone boxes in the UK
British type K6 telephone box (1936)
Green phone booth on the Isle of Man
modern telephone booth, type: KX plus internet
Type K4 with integrated postage stamp device and post box , so-called silent post office
Type K4 with integrated postage stamp dispenser and post box
See also
Web links
- The Telephone Box on Richard Coltman's website heritage.elettra.co.uk
- redphonebox.info - A pictorial guide to telephone boxes… , website by Robert Ore
Footnotes
- ^ Anne-Sophie Levy Chambon: "The little story" ... of the English telephone booth. (No longer available online.) In: ARTE . April 25, 2008, archived from the original on October 23, 2013 ; Retrieved April 29, 2012 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ a b c The different telephone kiosks: the changing face of public call boxes. In: Connected Earth. BT Group , accessed April 29, 2012 .
- ↑ Red Telephone Box facts. (No longer available online.) Remember When UK, archived from the original on March 4, 2007 ; Retrieved April 29, 2012 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ^ History. In: www.redphonebox.info. Retrieved April 29, 2012 .
- ↑ London: Adopting Red Telephone Booths . In: Focus . August 29, 2008
- ↑ British cult object: Red telephone boxes are for sale . In: Spiegel Online . April 27, 2012
- ^ The Telephone Box: History. (No longer available online.) Elettra.co.uk, archived from the original on May 13, 2012 ; Retrieved April 29, 2012 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ London sells telephone booths (dpa), Rhein Main Presse, April 28, 2012
