More historic red phone boxes are set to get a new lease of life under a groundbreaking charitable scheme.

Charitable trust Thinking Outside The Box has applied to breathe new life into seven more iconic phone boxes in Brighton a year on from their first conversion.

Booths in Dyke Road, Marine Parade, St Peter’s Place and Trafalgar Street could all be fitted with TV screens displaying adverts if plans are approved.

Under the Red Kiosk Company scheme, the historic boxes will receive a bi-annual maintenance and repaint job to prevent them falling into disrepair while raising money for local homeless charity Friends First.

The charity opened its first two converted phone booths fitted with a coffee machine and ice cream dispenser in New Road, Brighton, in June last year.

Two more followed shortly after close to the Palace Pier and the project has also taken off around the country including in London, Birmingham, Bradford and Nottingham.

The charity is aiming to soon have 500 kiosks fitted out nationwide with one of their latest renovations opening later this month on Eastbourne Pier.

The charity has a contract with BT to take on redundant telephone boxes which have had their phone systems stripped out.

The external appearance of the phone boxes is retained except for the additional security measures of a piano-style hinge to lock the door and replacing existing panels with 4mm-thick safety glass.

The phone boxes will remain painted in BT phone box red with a rolling maintenance programme in place.

The applications seek permission to install three 1.1m by 0.6m LCD digital advertising screens within the booths for up to five years.

The screens will be mounted on stands screwed into the base of kiosk and will operate between 10am and 10pm.

It is hoped that the most recent Brighton applications will be among the first in the country to have digital advertising displays following a link-up with Chinese designers in a scheme being backed by the Sussex Innovation Centre.

Miles Broe, the project’s architect, said the use of digital screens was drawn up after some councils raised concerns about the build up of pedestrians on pavements outside phone booths adapted for retail purposes.

He said: “You have some old booths that have had their doors off and just used as a toilet.

“All bar three of our kiosks have been locked up, renovated and replacement glass fitted so that they are looked after and cared for.

“We hope to raise at least as much as we do from advertising revenue as we currently do with retail.”

Decisions on the applications are expected in July.

Background

The first standard public telephone kiosk introduced by the Post Office was produced in concrete in 1920.

The iconic and distinctive of red telephone box design was drawn up by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott who was also responsible for Liverpool Cathedral, Waterloo Bridge and Battersea Power Station.

At the height of their popularity in the 1980s, there were 73,000 red phone booths around the country.