BT has insisted the most heavily-used payphone in Nottingham is being utilised by “tourists”, despite it not being near any notable attractions and claims by locals it is actually visited by “congregations of drug users”.
The booth in The Bridgeway Centre makes 3,000 calls a year, around eight times the national average. Chris Brummitt from the nearby Bridges Community Trust, told HuffPost UK: “It’s just known as the drug phone and it has been for the 10 years I’ve worked here.
“You see congregations of people around it who you can see are drug users.”
Brummit says of the two identical booths next to each other, only the one on the right (seen in the picture above) is used to buy drugs.
The Bridges Community Trust operates from a building next to the phones and wants it removed on anti-social grounds. But when contacted by HuffPost UK, a spokesperson for BT said it had no plans to do so as it could be used by tourists.
They added: “Until we get proof of how people are using the phone we’ve no plans to remove it due to its popularity.”
The Bridgeway Centre is a small shopping complex in the Meadows area of Nottingham and is now known for attracting tourists.
Brummitt said: “No, we don’t get any tourists here.”