If wandering through Fitzrovia the bottom of the tower is reached along a pokey, dull little alley. It feels so inauspicious considering this was the glam building built at a time when central London generally avoided building above the height of St.Pauls dome, the earlier Shell building alongside the Thames stopped 4 metres short.

I've always loved seeing it above everything. Even today it doesn't have high structures close to it.

If wandering through Fitzrovia the bottom of the tower is reached along a pokey, dull little alley.

Heh, been there, done that. Had to go there for a meeting and figured it would be easy enough to find. Then wandered around a bit trying to find the way in.

... and at least it's not being purchased - one hopes - by anyone or anything with a name bearing a suspicious similarity to WOTAN...

They ought to get a replica WOTAN made though and put it in the hotel lobby as an exhibit...

I've been lucky enough to have been up to the top several times. Still think it's the best view in London (no tourists, unlike the Shart)

I too have been up it a few years ago. Quite a splendid view and nice to watch it change, without having to leave your seat, at about 0.067rpm.

Famously has an exemption from the fire regulation about not using the lifts in case of a fire.

Famously has an exemption from the fire regulation about not using the lifts in case of a fire.

Oh, that's perfect for a hotel.

I recall going up the then Post Office Tower shortly after it was opened. Don't recall he year, but as I got a presentation pack of the postage stamps, must have been October 1965. All I recall of the actual visit was that the lift was really fast on the way up.

I also visited it a few times for work events, and have a certificate saying I visited the BT Tower on the 19th February 2010, signed by Sir Michael Rake, the then chair. (Night time view, if you went up in daylight I think you got a different certificate.)

I do hope they retain the rotating restaurant, it was good.

"unlike the Shart"

Oh good, not just me that calls it that :)

Even with something as patently obvious as the tower, there is a certain logic in not including some items on maps of the quality of Ordnance Survey. Particularly in the time before GPS. It meant any potential miscreants would have to have to do the work of plotting its position themselves. Not particularly onerous but something that would require reccy near the building.

An example of where security through obscurity can help, like when the Czechs took down street signs in 1968 when the Russians invaded.

Or put a commercial radio station in the lower floors and everyone will think that's the only occupant.

That'll be Capital Radio and denizens of MI5 /6

The UK's former state-owned telecoms giant

That was over 40 years ago. It became a PLC before most of your readership were even born. Don't you think perhaps it's irrelevant now?

Especially when we're still paying the price for selling it off and witnessing first hand what a disaster it is putting essential national infrastructure into private hands

BT is irrelevant now - they invented the monstrosity of bureaucracy that is OpenReach and I'll never forgive them for having created such a heinous behemoth that hides behind jargon, messes up jobs and messes them up again for good measure. In my 30-odd years of dealing with them, it's been nothing but hassle. I remember the first time I dealt with them, as a relative neophyte, we got them to wire up the comms frame to a patch panel, and they managed to only get the first socket right.

Telecoms giant they may have been, but give me a smaller provider any day

"the 177 meter (581 ft) high structure"

Meters measure things (electricity, pressure, etc).

Metres are the SI unit of length.

Metres are straight, meters are round.

But will Kitten Kong be invited to stay?

£275m sounds a bit cheap for such a building in London, does that not include the ground it sits on?

Its not obvious if they bought the whole BT site or just the tower itself. Being grade 2 listed means you can't do that much and certainly not knock it down and build something more profitable in its place.

Well, it is very thin, so it probably dosn't come with much ground.

Is this wise as all it'll take to crash is a power-cut or someone cutting a fiber cable with a JCB (backhoe).

Most data centres have multiple network and power connections, specifically picked to run nowhere near each other to reduce the chances of one JCB taking out multiple connections.

Of course, you can run applications internally, but most offices don't have redundant power or networking, so all it takes is one JCB to bring everything scratching to a halt.

I hope they revert it's name back to the GPO Tower, it's not BT that built it.

I read the central concrete pillar holding it up is strong enough to survive a nuclear blast, as it was absolutely necessary for comms during a possible war.

I'm not sure that the new owners would want to be associated with the Post Office. Would you?

Well you can see the Horizon from the top!

I see the Post Office as a redoubtable institution unfortunately brought low by a bunch of scheming liars in its own management and contractors. It could come back into it's own, I think, if handed over to the postmasters leaving Fujitsu and the top brass with the bill and a view of a brick wall from their cells.

Paid for by the taxpayer, it should never have been given to BT.

TBF It wasn't given, I think they paid £1 for all the GPO infrastructure... or was that Network Rail? British Gas? The CEGB? or CoVID Ferries? whatever - it was the Govt. of the time scratching the backs of their backers.

OK, if they open the revolving restaurant as well then I think a holiday in London may be on the cards for me.

So long as they don't get Butlins in again to run the restaurant like they did originally.

"used for corporate hospitality events for some years afterwards."

Also to celebrate allegedly successful sales projects - but only if you were on the manglement side. If you had to make it work when told about it the morning it was going live you were too late, the places had already been booked.