Pay phones may strike some as technological relics, but they help their users stay dialed in to life
Dinosaurs still exist in Seattle.
Many are just a shell, a husk used only by local graffiti artists. More are derelict, abandoned by their owners. But in certain parts of Seattle, the dinosaurs still survive, remnants of a bygone era when they once had importance. Unlike the dinosaurs of epochs past, which possessed sharp claws or giant wings, modern-day dinosaurs come armed with keypads and coin processors. Today’s dinosaurs are pay phones.
To a pay phone user like Scott, however, the phones are more than just an ancient relic: They’re his main mode of communication. A self-described “tech guy,” Scott got rid of his cell phone around a year ago when Edward Snowden revealed the extent of National Security Administration phone-tapping practices. “It offends me that the government would use a phone that I’m paying for to keep track of me,” he said.
While his reasoning may be personal, Scott is not the only one still making use of pay phones. Just as pay phones can serve as a communications lifeline during natural disasters, every day pay phones in Seattle serve as a lifeline for those dealing with life’s smaller disasters. And as long as there’s still money to be made by providing an alternative to cell phones, there will still be some pay phones out there somewhere. They might just be harder to find.
Going, but not gone
At their peak in 1999, there were more than two million pay phones in the U.S. Now there are approximately 150,000 left, according to the Federal Communications Commission (fcc). In 2014, there were 3,182 pay phones left in Washington state, down from 14,999 recorded six years earlier. The rapid disappearance of what was once a public fixture has prompted some to ask, “Where did all the pay phones go?”
The short answer is that cell phones have played the role of comet to the seemingly prehistoric pay phone, leading to its near extinction. A 2014 city of Seattle technological survey, conducted by phone, found that 89 percent of households in Seattle have some kind of cell phone. With the associated decline in pay phone usage, many businesses have decided not to invest the $150 a month required to operate a pay phone.
Public libraries in Seattle once offered pay phones as a public resource. Now only the Central Library has pay phones, eight in total — though on a recent visit, one was out of order. Local libraries track where pay phones can be found throughout the city.
Other local resources, such as the Northgate and Shoreline transit centers, still feature pay phones. So does Sea-Tac Airport. The Green Lake Community Center has two pay phones that are used by “at least one [person] a day,” according to a community center employee, but both are currently out of order.
The declining use of pay phones represents less of a sudden change and more a gradual state of atrophy, as removing a pay phone is easier than repairing one. But even dated technology can have relevance in modern life.
After Hurricane Sandy struck in October 2012, pay phones in New York served as a communication lifeline when power outages rendered cell phones unusable. Although Seattle’s Office of Emergency Management doesn’t include pay phones in its post-disaster planning, pay phones can serve as a valuable alternative to cell phones.
On hold
The working pay phones at the Central Library are split between two banks: one next to the bathrooms on the first floor and one near the red stairs on the third floor. On a recent November morning, the only person at the first floor phone bank was a young woman using the pay phone seat to listen to music on her cell phone. A man stopped by to use the pay phone, but other than saying pay phones were his main mode of communication, he wouldn’t share his name. He used the phone for a few minutes, and then he left.
Then there was Charles. Unlike Scott earlier, Charles isn’t a regular pay phone user. He owned a cell phone but had trouble loading his sports news on it. Unable to use his phone and troubleshoot it at the same time, he needed a pay phone to call the customer help line. He ran out of time halfway through his call and had to call back, but a few quarters later he was able to resolve the issue and leave, cell phone in hand.
Over the course of two hours, three people used the pay phones, a rate that a librarian suggested is standard for that phone bank. Several days later, right as the two-hour mark approached, three people arrived to use pay phones, one after another.
The first was Evan. Originally from Ontario, Canada, he had traveled to Seattle by way of Vancouver, B.C. His cell phone had been stolen in the first week of November, and he has been relying on pay phones ever since. He placed a collect call, but when his friend didn’t pick up, he couldn’t leave a message. So he waited for 15 minutes, and he munched on a loaf of bread and some Brussel sprouts. “I might be back later,” he said after another unsuccessful attempt.
While Evan hadn’t experienced any issues finding pay phones, the second person to arrive, an older gentleman who barely stopped to talk said, these days, it is “hard to find pay phones.”
The third person, a man wearing a Seahawks beanie, said his cell phone had been stolen in mid-November. For a while, he had been able to borrow other people’s phones, but was “having a bad day” and now needed a pay phone to reach a friend. He inserted enough quarters to make a long-distance call and reached who he was looking for on his second try. While the phone call only lasted a few words, the whole process took about five minutes.
Barely 30 minutes later, two more men rushed in to use the pay phones. One, a large man in a red cowboy hat, placed a call to get an advance on his Social Security payment in order to pay bills due that day. The second, an older man with a wind-burned face, had a free cell phone supplied by the U.S. government to low-income people but with no available minutes left. He was using the pay phone to try and replace the cell phone. It didn’t work out.
“Figures,” he grumbled after failing to reach anyone.
As he stood near the pay phone, he still had his cell phone in his hand — not that he could use it.
“This?” he said, waving the cell phone. “This is a piece of shit.”