Gold post box to honour Olympic champions

Royal Mail painted one of their red post boxes gold on Friday, 2nd November, in honour of Wilmslow's Olympic heroes.

The post box outside of Tesco Express on Alderley Road has been painted gold to celebrate the gold medal wins of cyclists Craig MacLean and Victoria Pendleton.

George Osborne was in town to officially unveil the gold post box and congratulate Craig MacLean who has lived in the Wilmslow for the past three years.

Craig won his gold medal at the London 2012 Paralympics with his cycling partner Anthony Kappes. Craig was pilot in the men's tandem sprint for the blind and visually impaired.

He told wilmslow.co.uk "Just like having the freedom of the Borough it's a great honour to have a gold post box. They have just announced that the gold post boxes are going to stay like that with a plaque so even if I am not a Wilmslow resident all my life I'll always be able to come back and visit it."

George Osborne said "Congratulations to Craig MacLean. It is brilliant that he is a hero of Wilmslow and the gold letterbox will be a permanent reminder of his incredible achievement this year."

Victoria, 32, who won a gold medal in the keirin and silver medal in the sprint final at the London Olympics, was unable to attend on Friday due to her Strictly Come Dancing commitments.

Royal Mail announced yesterday that the post boxes it has painted to celebrate the gold medals of Team GB and Paralympics GB will remain gold on a permanent basis. 111 gold post boxes have now been painted across the UK. Each post box will have a plaque with the names of the athletes to mark their gold medal achievements.

The post boxes have now become cherished local landmarks, with many members of the public visiting them, and the Wilmslow one is already proving popular with members of the public stopping to have their photo taken with it.

Moya Greene, Chief Executive Officer, Royal Mail Group, said; "We are delighted at the way people took to this simple idea.

"The gold post boxes gave communities even more opportunity to mark the successes of Team GB and Paralympics GB - and became a part of local celebrations of London 2012 across the UK. I am pleased to confirm that these post boxes will be kept gold permanently."