The City of London is opening a design competition for a 21st-century Police Box to be placed around the Square Mile.
The new police box will need to be large enough to accommodate two police officers and will have an external digital screen allowing people to have video calls with authorities and request local area information. They are expected to also store medical equipment for local emergency response.
Not the likely design – alas
The competition, being run by the City of London Corporation, the City of London Police, New London Architecture (NLA) and Bloomberg Associates.
Up to six shortlisted teams will be awarded funding to develop their idea into a design proposal, with the winning design due to be revealed in the summer.
Managing Director at New London Architecture (NLA), Tamsie Thomson, said: “The intersection of design and public infrastructure can be magical: think of Giles Gilbert Scott’s iconic red telephone boxes. And as any Dr Who fan knows, the old-fashioned blue police box has inspired many flights of fancy. Now we’re looking for another imaginative reinvention to grace the City’s streets and serve the public for years to come.”
Up to six shortlisted teams will be awarded £1,500 in funding to develop their idea into a design proposal. The winning team will be revealed in late May 2021 after which the City of London Police will start the process of raising the funding for the delivery of the selected design scheme – which are expected to cost around £250,000 per site.
The design competition details are here.
Nothing wrong with the original design given all the room inside compared to street space occupied!
I can remember when there was an original one in Goswell Road near Spencer Street
The whole point of the Police Box is the ORIGINAL design. Why change it?
The whole point of the police box is to be of use to the police.
Those needs change over time.
Hope the City authorities are aware that any Tardis which can change how it looks belongs to the Master. They really don’t want that sort of trouble do they?
It should look like the one outside Earls Court station.
Interestingly, you can explore its massive interior with Streetview, just click on the arrow when it points towards the box.
The problem with that one is that it’s huge – you can easily put four people inside and even on the wide pavement outside the station it takes up a lot of space — not suitable for the City of London’s narrow streets.
More about it here.
There’s always the 1-man version…