|
THE
POST OFFICE
by E.F.WARREN, Postmaster
THE Newport Head Post Office occupies a central position in High Street,
and besides providing for the needs of the town, serves as a distributing
office for all the mails for Monmouthshire and most of those for Breconshire
and Radnorshire. The area for the administration of which it is directly
responsible covers four-fifths of Monmouthshire and extends in places over
the borders of neighbouring counties. The total area is about 400 square
miles and its total population is greater that that of the area of any
comparable Head Post Office. There are 182 subordinate post office.
The first record of a Post Office at Newport
is dated 1864 when the total staff employed was 10. The total staff to-day
numbers over 300. The first Post Office on the present site in High Street
was occupied in 1907, but the original building has since been altered and
enlarged, reconstruction schemes having been carried out in 1911, 1917,and
1918. The present building is however, now too small for modern requirements,
and further scheme of reconstruction, in the course of which the whole of the
adjoining Savoy Hotel site (purchased in anticipation in 1914) will be
absorbed, is due to be commenced this year.
[Sadly the Post Office Sorting & Delivery
Office was moved to Mill Street in 1969 and the Post Office Counter was moved
to Bridge Street]
The first Post Office Telephone Exchange in Newport was opened in August 1881, but
there is no record of the number of subscribers. The Exchange was converted
to automatic working for local calls in 1913, being one of the first
exchanges in the kingdom to be so converted. The number of local subscribers
is now nearly 3,000.There are 39 other telephone exchanges in the
administrative area.
The use of motor transport in the postal service is increasing rapidly.
There are now 17 vans and motor cycle combinations operating from the Newport
Office, and this number will be increased very shortly to 27. To provide
garaging and maintenance for these the Post Office is now building in Rodney Road a new
garage and workshop, which, is hoped, will be completed this year. Besides
collection and delivery services in the town, the Post Office vans operate
road services to Chepstow, Monmouth (and intervening places) and the towns in
the Eastern, western, Sirhowy and Rhymney
Valleys. Other vans and
motor-cycle combinations operate from the subordinate offices; the total
number of vans operating in the administrative area being 43.
There are direct letter and parcel mails between Newport
and all the important towns in the kingdom, including places as far distant
as Perth in Scotland
and Waterford and Dublin
in Ireland.
The average number of letters posted in the town and the average number of
letters delivered both exceed fourteen millions annually. More than 140,000
bags of letters and parcels are despatched annually from the Head Office and
over 300,000 bags are received.
Telegraphically, the Newport Office is in direct communication with all
the neighbouring towns as well as with London,
Bristol and Birmingham.
The average number of telegrams dealt with annually is nearly 500,000. And
the traffic is now steadily increasing after some years of depression
|
