To: South Lakeland District Council
Stop phone box closures in South Lakeland
Ask South Lakeland District Council to use their legal vetoes to prevent closure of a large number of phone boxes. This is not a general request. It must be for individual phone boxes, at named locations, so please don't use the normal button for this petition - go to this link instead.
http://www.torver.org/phone-box-closure/phone-box-schedule
The deadline is very tight.
Why is this important?
We have experienced several severe weather events in recent years, including gales, heavy and prolonged snowfall, and flooding. Any event of this sort, as well as being potentially hazardous for us all (and especially for anyone making a journey) places the communication systems under stress. Mobile phone systems are commendably reliable, but are always dependent on continued operation of the base station. The key to making systems resilient in the most severe conditions is duplication - in this case the land line system as well as the mobiles. For someone in difficulty or travelling, a phone call at the right time can avoid an emergency, or worse, later.
BT propose to close many of the phone boxes in the county. The list shows 73 boxes to be closed in South Lakeland, 40 of them within the Lake District National Park. Many more boxes are to be closed in other districts of Cumbria, both inside and outside the Lake District.
This will leave us without public phones for long distances in hilly rural areas. In cases of difficulty or emergency, the phones are an important part of our diverse communication system - they need to be kept operating if only for this reason.
