The problem of area codes

[kphoger]

Land lines get the old codes; mobile (and non-voice) lines get the new codes.

That was the original intention when cellphones first became available.  NYC was going to be the first test of such a system, where cellphones were to use Area Code 917, while landlines stayed with 212 and 718.  The FCC shut that down almost immediately.  All services use area codes equally, and that's not likely to change now.

And 630 for cell phones around Chicago.  630 then became an area code for sururban Chicago.

I didn't know that about the 630 area code, and I used to have a 630 cell phone number.  However, I didn't get it until 2000 and was not living in the area when 630 launched.  Do you have an article you could link to about that?

[Big John]

^^ The overlay proposal was never approved, then it got assigned as a regular area code.  I have been looking for a link with no avail.

[DTComposer]

Back to area codes, I'm of the mind that we could have (and should have) realized what an explosion of numbers we'd need for mobile and data and established overlays on all area codes right away. Land lines get the old codes; mobile (and non-voice) lines get the new codes.

Predict what will happen 20 years from now.  Be accurate and precise.

Fair point, but in 1991, 3% of the US population had a cell phone. By 1995 (the first year an area code without 0 or 1 as the middle digit was in use) it was 12% and by 1998 it was 25%. Did industry people at the time really think that was going to level off?

I admit it seems obvious in hindsight, but my experience in the '90s saw that explosion in cell phone use happening all around me.

[jeffandnicole]

Back to area codes, I'm of the mind that we could have (and should have) realized what an explosion of numbers we'd need for mobile and data and established overlays on all area codes right away. Land lines get the old codes; mobile (and non-voice) lines get the new codes.

Predict what will happen 20 years from now.  Be accurate and precise.

Fair point, but in 1991, 3% of the US population had a cell phone. By 1995 (the first year an area code without 0 or 1 as the middle digit was in use) it was 12% and by 1998 it was 25%. Did industry people at the time really think that was going to level off?

I admit it seems obvious in hindsight, but my experience in the '90s saw that explosion in cell phone use happening all around me.

And, yeah, I know I was being a bit of a smartass there.  But it really is surprising how cell phone usage exploded.  Growing up, most houses had one phone number.  Maybe a second for their teenagers.  I don't think anyone expected each parent to have a number, each teen to have a number, and a fair number of children getting a phone while still in their elementary school years.  So for many families, that's twice to quadruple the numbers that families had back in the 1990's and prior.  And then many people still have a home number, and working people may have both a work landline number and a work cell number.

And how cell phones advanced probably didn't cross most people's minds.  We were mainly using computers for our computing needs, and cameras for our photography needs.  Even the internet was in its infancy at that time.  I don't think anyone (ok, maybe a few) saw cell phones becoming the prime tool for all 3.

But here's the other thing that probably caught people by surprise - with all these phones and phone numbers, actual calls didn't go up all that much, and are currently trending down.  And land lines have been decreasing for many years.  So if area code was dedicated to landlines and area codes were dedicated to cell phones, we would probably be running out of phone numbers for those dedicated area codes.

It's a funny world we live in.  What people predicted to occur often hasn't, and what people never had a clue about now rules our everyday lives.

[ZLoth]

And, yeah, I know I was being a bit of a smartass there.  But it really is surprising how cell phone usage exploded.  Growing up, most houses had one phone number.  Maybe a second for their teenagers.  I don't think anyone expected each parent to have a number, each teen to have a number, and a fair number of children getting a phone while still in their elementary school years.  So for many families, that's twice to quadruple the numbers that families had back in the 1990's and prior.  And then many people still have a home number, and working people may have both a work landline number and a work cell number.

In some cases, three lines... my parents had one, I had one for voice and one for data because it was the 90s and we had dial-up connections. I can assure you that the payment for my two lines came out of my wallet including installation.

And how cell phones advanced probably didn't cross most people's minds.  We were mainly using computers for our computing needs, and cameras for our photography needs.  Even the internet was in its infancy at that time.  I don't think anyone (ok, maybe a few) saw cell phones becoming the prime tool for all 3.

That's because cell phones were expensive to use and charged by the minute. When I got my first mobile phone, the Airtouch plan I had provided me 50 minutes of peak usage (7 AM-8 PM local time), and about 200 minutes of non-peak usage (8 PM-7 AM local time, 24 hours on the weekend) per month. It didn't even have SMS calling or Bluetooth. I remember a family friend warning me that "you'll get that first phone bill, and you will put that phone in a drawer for quite a while." Unfortunately, I had my eyes wide open and guarded those minutes with a vengeance, so no surprise bill ever came. A few years later, when the plans were more generous with the minutes, I ditched the landline for voice and went strictly mobile, although I kept the data line. That line was soon converted to a ADSL line.

(I remember the plan details clearly, but not the exact times. When I did a Google search for Airtouch advertising, it brought up ads for old Airtouch phones and CPAP masks.)

But here's the other thing that probably caught people by surprise - with all these phones and phone numbers, actual calls didn't go up all that much, and are currently trending down.  And land lines have been decreasing for many years.  So if area code was dedicated to landlines and area codes were dedicated to cell phones, we would probably be running out of phone numbers for those dedicated area codes.

As someone who is on the phone at work all day, I really don't talk much when in personal mode. Funny that.

[geek11111]

Many countries set up a block of area codes for cellphones.

[kalvado]

Many countries set up a block of area codes for cellphones.

Which may also be a hindsight is always 20-20 policy as landlines are dying as a concept and countries commit to cleanup and full removal of copper phone infrastructure.

[1995hoo]

Regarding ZLoth's comment about being cautious with your minutes, don't forget the days when you were limited in where you could simply use your mobile phone versus where you would be "roaming," which incurred higher charges.

[ZLoth]

One of the reasons why mobile phones were expensive in the 90s was that it was analog (AMPS), so when you had a call, it took up an entire frequency in the 800Mhz range. The allocation of the radio spectrum is strictly controlled by the FCC or your country's regulatory authority, and they can't create more spectrum, so you manage it as best as you can. (As an example, Analog TV broadcast channels 70-83 were discontinued and the associated frequencies reallocated to mobile phone use.) When mobile phones went digital, they utilized either CDMA, TDMA, or GSM on either 2G or 3G. Although each technology is different in it's implementation, for our purposes, they were a form of "time slicing" a phone call so that multiple calls can fit in a single frequency.

In terms of twisted pair copper... even if you have a POTS landline phone, that is only good up to the telco switching office. Once there, it gets converted into a digital signal. Some of the copper infrastructure is decades old and is deteriorating, and the telcos really want to obsolete it out in favor of VoIP. Some folks are pushing back because the phone line would remain on during a power outage because of the generators at the telco switching offices.

[kphoger]

And, yeah, I know I was being a bit of a smartass there.  But it really is surprising how cell phone usage exploded.  Growing up, most houses had one phone number.  Maybe a second for their teenagers.  I don't think anyone expected each parent to have a number, each teen to have a number, and a fair number of children getting a phone while still in their elementary school years.  So for many families, that's twice to quadruple the numbers that families had back in the 1990's and prior.  And then many people still have a home number, and working people may have both a work landline number and a work cell number.

When my family first got a cell phone, it was to keep in the car in case of an emergency when driving out of town.  We therefore didn't consider it a possibility that more than one person in the family would need a cell phone at any given time, because only one vehicle would be driving out of town at any given time.  The idea that each person would keep a cell phone on his or her person at all times didn't come into vogue until the early 2000s.

In terms of twisted pair copper... even if you have a POTS landline phone, that is only good up to the telco switching office. Once there, it gets converted into a digital signal. Some of the copper infrastructure is decades old and is deteriorating, and the telcos really want to obsolete it out in favor of VoIP. Some folks are pushing back because the phone line would remain on during a power outage because of the generators at the telco switching offices.

And, even if you have VoIP phones, that doesn't necessarily mean the internet connection carrying your call isn't using RF/coax/copper to get from node to house anyway.  Here in Wichita, Cox Communications finally obsolesced outdoor phone NIUs within the last few years.  That is to say, some customers still didn't even have digital landline phone service until recently.  I'm only familiar with certain other markets, but similar is true for Omaha and Oklahoma City.

[MikeTheActuary]

Many countries set up a block of area codes for cellphones.

In most of those countries, the caller pays for the air time used by the call.   Making it easy to distinguish a cell number helps make it clear that there will be an added toll when you call it.

[kphoger]

Many countries set up a block of area codes for cellphones.

In most of those countries, the caller pays for the air time used by the call.   Making it easy to distinguish a cell number helps make it clear that there will be an added toll when you call it.

Mexico handled this by having a different prefix to dial for cell phones when calling from a landline phone.  It used to be 044+ the number for local landline-to-cellular calls and 045+ for long-distance landline-to-cellular calls.  And, dialing in from outside the country, it required a 1+ between the country code and the phone number.  This system of prefixes was done away with in 2019, in favor of 10-digit dialing across the board, but I think they had to change their pricing scheme in order to do so.

[Poiponen13]

Could letters be added? The format would be AB-123-XXXX, where the AB is the area code (from AA to ZZ, using all 26 letters), 123 is central office code and XXXX is line number, which can contain both numbers and letters in all four positions. The 10 numbers and 26 letters could be arranged to 6 x 6 square on keypad.

[ran4sh]

Many countries set up a block of area codes for cellphones.

Which may also be a hindsight is always 20-20 policy as landlines are dying as a concept and countries commit to cleanup and full removal of copper phone infrastructure.

Which is stupid bc landline 911 is a lot more reliable than cellphone 911 (especially for areas that are near jurisdictional borders).

[kphoger]

Could letters be added? The format would be AB-123-XXXX, where the AB is the area code (from AA to ZZ, using all 26 letters), 123 is central office code and XXXX is line number, which can contain both numbers and letters in all four positions. The 10 numbers and 26 letters could be arranged to 6 x 6 square on keypad.

How would it be better to make everyone, everywhere, in the whole world, but new telephones with alphanumeric keypads–than to simply add a digit to the existing phone numbers?

[ran4sh]

Could letters be added? The format would be AB-123-XXXX, where the AB is the area code (from AA to ZZ, using all 26 letters), 123 is central office code and XXXX is line number, which can contain both numbers and letters in all four positions. The 10 numbers and 26 letters could be arranged to 6 x 6 square on keypad.

Good luck paying to replace all the existing equipment just to replace it with equipment that can dial letters.

[kalvado]

Many countries set up a block of area codes for cellphones.

In most of those countries, the caller pays for the air time used by the call.   Making it easy to distinguish a cell number helps make it clear that there will be an added toll when you call it.

Mexico handled this by having a different prefix to dial for cell phones when calling from a landline phone.  It used to be 044+ the number for local landline-to-cellular calls and 045+ for long-distance landline-to-cellular calls.  And, dialing in from outside the country, it required a 1+ between the country code and the phone number.  This system of prefixes was done away with in 2019, in favor of 10-digit dialing across the board, but I think they had to change their pricing scheme in order to do so.

Voice calls cost going to essentially zero is a big factor in defining how phone system operates anyway... 

[kalvado]

Many countries set up a block of area codes for cellphones.

Which may also be a hindsight is always 20-20 policy as landlines are dying as a concept and countries commit to cleanup and full removal of copper phone infrastructure.

Which is stupid bc landline 911 is a lot more reliable than cellphone 911 (especially for areas that are near jurisdictional borders).

Emergency calling, while important, doesn't define the whole situation. And ability to get location from the caller's cell phone was one of big things introduced to alleviate that - even before GPS was brought to every handset. 
As for landline more reliable... There was a pretty funny (or sad) story about homeowner on state (I want to say MA-VT, but not really sure) border who called 911 for the fire in the shed - only to learn that MA firefighters he reached from the home on MA side of the lot cannot deal with the shed on VT side...
On a similar note, university dorm complex next door is divided between 3 fire districts (and since state university property is tax exempt, nobody want to take full responsibility). All landline calls from the university are recognized under single number. Even without that, tracing numbers down to buildings and portions of buildings is pretty messy... 

[GaryV]

Could letters be added? The format would be AB-123-XXXX, where the AB is the area code (from AA to ZZ, using all 26 letters), 123 is central office code and XXXX is line number, which can contain both numbers and letters in all four positions. The 10 numbers and 26 letters could be arranged to 6 x 6 square on keypad.

Unless you change every telephone in the world to enable distinct letters, you won't get 26x26 letter possibilities. You'll get 8x8.

On current phones, AA is the same as AB and AC and BA and BB and BC and CA and CB and CC.

[kalvado]

Could letters be added? The format would be AB-123-XXXX, where the AB is the area code (from AA to ZZ, using all 26 letters), 123 is central office code and XXXX is line number, which can contain both numbers and letters in all four positions. The 10 numbers and 26 letters could be arranged to 6 x 6 square on keypad.

Unless you change every telephone in the world to enable distinct letters, you won't get 26x26 letter possibilities. You'll get 8x8.

On current phones, AA is the same as AB and AC and BA and BB and BC and CA and CB and CC.

And don't forget that while pretty much everyone uses Arabic numerals, Latin alphabet is far from universal. 

[Scott5114]

Right, what happens when I want to call up someone in Chernihiv and their area code is ПЖ?

[Road Hog]

I would imagine we'd exhaust the Greek alphabet first before we resorted to Cyrillic, which shares some letters with both languages.

[kalvado]

I would imagine we'd exhaust the Greek alphabet first before we resorted to Cyrillic, which shares some letters with both languages.

So why do you think English version of Latin alphabet has to go first? Using German increases number of letters due to umlauts!

[kphoger]

I would imagine we'd exhaust the Greek alphabet first before we resorted to Cyrillic, which shares some letters with both languages.

So why do you think English version of Latin alphabet has to go first? Using German increases number of letters due to umlauts!

Thorn and Ash for the win!

[rlb2024]

Expansion to four-digit area codes is already provided for in the North American Numbering Plan (NANP).  All existing area codes would have 9 added in between the first and second digits (notice no current area codes have 9 and the second digit).  That would provide for a 10x expansion to over 6,000 area codes within the NANP.