Telephone exchange: Lower Village phone box to turn over new leaf as books box

The old red phone box in Heswall Lower Village is finally to be given a new purpose in life.

The Heswall Society, supported by generous donations of almost £500 made by readers of Heswall Today - now Heswall Nub News - has decided the nice K6 kiosk will become, in common with many other community kiosks across the country, a book exchange.

The Heswall Society adopted the call box in 2018, and reader donations helped pay the legal fees involved. These were incurred because, unlike most kiosks, the village box does not stand on land owned by the local council.

The Society and supporters were well ahead of the curve - this week BT renewed its drive to persuade communities to adopt their kiosks, now barely used in the age of the smartphone.

Book shelves will be installed in ours soon - splendidly provided for free by a local contractor.

However, as of today, there is currently some sort of excavation work underway right next to the kiosk, which, unless the Heswall Society has commissioned an underground car park to serve this new local library, may be related to the gas supply upgrade being given to the area.

Let's hope the digging doesn't delay the shelving.

Thanks for the readers who suggested the kiosk should be home to DVDs of the movies 'Dial M for Murder', 'Phone Booth' and Phone Call From A Stranger'. Any other suggestions gratefully received.

A new lease of life for the kiosk is great news, but has left in tatters many people's ambitions - ours included - to install a defibrillator within it.

A defibrillator is a device which can be used by almost anyone to give a high energy electric shock to the heart of someone who is in cardiac arrest - and, again following an example set many times elsewhere, the old box seemed the perfect location for one.

However, all is not lost.

We will find an alternative Lower Village location for the defibrillator, and launch a Just Giving page next week to see if we can raise the necessary money - which comes to around £2000 depending on which device is bought.

This will be a useful resource to add to the defibrillator in Heswall Library, making sure the whole of the area is covered.