Charminster: Lower Charminster Road Post Office

Image: © Chris Downer Taken: 24 Sep 2008

Lower Charminster Road Post Office was established in 1910; it became a Money Order and Savings Bank on 1 September 1922 and a Telegraph Office on 3 March 1926. In the mid-1990s it moved from 343-345 Charminster Road to new premises within the One Stop convenience store a short distance away at no. 269-273, which became the Co-Op as you see now. (The postbox was not moved, however: see Image) This was more suitable premises in that the old shop had two steps up to its entrance whereas this shop has level access and automatic doors. It was announced this week that it is to be a casualty of the 2008 closures, whereby 2,500 offices will close, meaning that it will close permanently in October 2008, a year or two short of its centenary. UPDATE: The office finally closed at 1pm on Wednesday 29 October. I visited the Co-Op just after 5 o'clock that evening, by which time there was already no visible sign that a post office had ever been contained within the store. Only the oval sign outside alluded to that fact. The name 'Lower' Charminster Road distinguishes this office from the one called plain Charminster Road, farther south at no. 63-65. The Co-Op is open 24 hours a day; the spherical foliage in the foreground is one of several adorning both frontages of the restaurant opposite.

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