237 Police Boxes???????

[whitestar2010]

Found this story online this today:

By DAVE MASTERS
Sun Online

"MAP experts have tracked down all the old blue police call boxes in the UK - on which Dr Who's Tardis was modelled.
A high-tech ordinance survey map of Britain allowed them to locate all 237 PCBs still in existence.
The cubes - made redundant by cop radios in 1969 - used to be a familiar sight in cities across the country.
They had a blue light on top which used to flash when officers were needed by their station.
And they also contained a telephone which would give members of the public and officers a direct link to a cop shop.
The move to trace the boxes comes after detectives unveiled plans to introduce modern versions with internet and webcams.
When sci-fi show Dr Who started in 1963, the police box was adopted as the ideal vehicle for the fictional time lord and proved a favourite with fans."


I've seen this story before somewhere, but 237 boxes?
Those map guys HAVE go to be looking at out of date material surely. If not I'd love to know exactly where these hundreds of boxes are hiding.

[Mark]

Oooo, which site was that Dale?

[cyberleader1991]

Maybe that figure includes the ones made by us... 

That would be a compliment, dontcha think? 

[Mark]

I saw that artice too Whitestar.

The version I saw was something to do with Ordenance Survey but there was nothing on their site.

If I read the piece properly, they way I figured it, the 237 boxes are still on street!

I travel around quite a lot with work and I'm always keeping my eyes open for remaining police boxes, but the only ones I've seen are the ones we already know about.

Perhaps you're right Cy, maybe the map says:- Police box in Scarborogh, Police Box in Sheffield, Police Box at Puple's house.....

[peted]

How many in edinburgh? Maybe 20 odd?
Newport is about, oooh, 3? Glasgow is, what, 5? UK - - maybe 7 or 8 that I know (various flavours)... it's not 200 odd, that's for sure... found a cracking photo of a Nottm one I took years ago, they should win the 'crappest police boxes ever award'.

[davidpk212]

Wonder if they named them all? Would be funny yo see one labelled "Purple's TARDIS", etc...!

[ironageman]

Certainly some wooden 'garden shed' type boxes are now used as... er...  garden sheds. But even if you stretch your imagination to there being 200 of them I don't think that the OS would mark them unless they were still in situ.

There must still be a lot of masonry ones about though - and perhaps, if you (or the OS) include the larger 'mini police station' type, there are hundreds of them. They just don't look much like the Tardis. A couple of Brighton and Hove ones were sold recently, and if you google for: scotts grimsby police box ...you'll find a Grimsby one for sale at the moment for £75,000.

[Mark]

How much!!

Definately hope it's bigger on the inside for that price!

[ironageman]

Wait a mo, 20 in Edinburgh? There are many more than that...

I was browsing planning applications relating to police boxes (well, it beats having a life) and found one from 2003 for conversion of a police box on Brighton Pier "for the sale of cold food." Yes, I know, police box on Brighton Pier sounds a bit like a Tardis replica, but still, I wondered...

[dalethetimelord]

Actually, I don't find it hard to believe - given the still extant Scottish boxes, some in Wales, and a greater number of non-TARDIS boxes than perhaps we know about - only last night I was looking on some local council sites, and found a brick (no, really) Police Box, and a lot of metal ones, which ranged in size from a basic single wardrobe size, to a great long metal box that housed a staff sergeant!  237 isn't so hard to believe... or perhaps I'm an eternal optimist.

[scruffy57]

Hi again
I haven't been on here much but I hope this could be of assistance to PCB hunters like myself.
The National Library of Scotland (NLS) has produce some excellent overlay maps of the UK.
One I use in particular is dated around 1950 and shows all the TCB's and PCB's.
I will post a link to the site and a screenshot of the Mitcham Lane Streatham PCB location

http://maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/#zoom=19&lat=51.4194&lon=-0.1477&layers=173&b=1

Regards Scruffy

[hb88banzai]

Yes, the NLS offerings are quite a valuable resource (though as they state, their collection was not complete and the scanning of parts of it is still a work in progress), as is https://www.old-maps.co.uk/.

Thanks for pointing it out - starcross and I should probably have done so awhile back.

[galacticprobe]

Wow! Too bad we can't get a copy of that map to post here. (We'd need an entire page and probably more to fit it!)

Thanks for pointing it out - starcross...

I think you mean "scruffy" (scruffy57).

...and I should probably have done so awhile back.

Mmmmm... Yeah... maybe. (Don't worry; we won't hold it against you. )

Dino.

[hb88banzai]

Wow! Too bad we can't get a copy of that map to post here. (We'd need an entire page and probably more to fit it!)

Thanks for pointing it out - starcross...

I think you mean "scruffy" (scruffy57).

Nope - put a dash between the clauses for a separate thought. Starcross is the person I told about it when I first came across the site about a year-and-a-half ago as a higher and cleaner resolution alternative (though harder to work with) to the Old-maps site mentioned above, particularly when researching Edinburgh, so is the only one of us that knew about it before now and thus could have posted the url.

Wasn't sure anyone else was really interested at the time, so sorry, my bad .

BTW - you don't get an image of the whole map at the NLS site, only the portion currently in your viewer, which is generally a small portion of same when zoomed in enough to really see the Box or Post. You can buy a copy of the whole map, but the expense would get out of hand very rapidly considering the number of maps involved of various dates and sizes for all the Metropolitan Police district (coverage is not complete, either), to say nothing of Glasgow and Edinburgh as well.

[domvar]

They mean this sort of thing there is one near me that has just been sold off as well so 237 sounds a bit low but it's not really a box it's a mini police station with a phone door

http://www.theargus.co.uk/news/1957205.htm/

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@50.8430091,-0.1349354,3a,40.5y,135.31h,85.08t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1svcmT3Ui5bqmgemzM127lgA!2e0!7i13312!8i6656