Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!sdd.hp.com!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!casbah.acns.nwu.edu!accuvax.nwu.edu!nucsrl!telecom-request From: bill@gauss.eedsp.gatech.edu (bill) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: 215 Area Code Loses "1" per Newspaper 'Reporter' Message-ID: <15527@accuvax.nwu.edu> Date: 19 Dec 90 16:48:31 GMT Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu Reply-To: bill@eedsp.gatech.edu Organization: TELECOM Digest Lines: 96 Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 892, Message 4 of 9 [Moderator's Note: I realize this next article sounds stupid. But do not blame Bill ... don't flame the messanger; but rather, the message itself and the original author. Read it and we'll chat about it afterward. PAT] UPma 12/12 1156 215 area code loses ``1'', gains millions of numbers By SUE MORGAN PHILADELPHIA (UPI) -- Telephone numbers aren't a limitless resource, and phone customers in eastern Pennsylvania will soon feel the consequences of that fact of life, Bell of Pennsylvania said Wednesday. Beginning Jan. 14, customers in the 215 dialing area -- which includes Philadelphia and its suburbs, Reading, and Allentown -- will no longer have to dial a "1" before dialing a long-distance number in that area. The elimination of the digit will allow Bell to squeeze another 1.6 million new telephone numbers in to the growing area, said Bell spokesman Tom Duddy. "People used to think that this (telephone numbers) was a bottomless resource, like the ocean or the sky, and we're finding out that's not true," Duddy said. "You use enough of something and you can run out of it, whether it be the ocean or the sky or telephone numbers." There are already about 6.4 million telephone numbers assigned in the 215 area, Duddy said. He said the ubiquitous fax machine and cellular telephone are partly to blame for the number crunch. "If you look four or five years ago, how many people had fax machines? Now everybody has a fax machine. The same thing with cellular telephones. All these things add more telephone numbers." The elimination of the "1" for long-distance numbers in the 215 area will only forestall the inevitable -- creation of a new area code in eastern Pennsylvania, possibly as soon as the mid-1990s. A new area code was created earlier this year in New Jersey, where a chunk of the 201 area was split off to form area code 908. Duddy said the governing body which oversees area codes will not grant new area codes to local telephone companies until they take all possible steps, including eliminating the "1." Customers in the 215 area will be able to dial with or without the "1" between Jan. 14 and Sept. 23, when the change will become mandatory. The spokesman said the phone company is hoping the long transition period will make customers comfortable with the change. Letters will be going out next week to residential customers, and the company plans to do other advertising. Bell will spend about $1 million to make the change. Duddy said customers in Pennsylvania's other three calling areas don't have to worry -- there are plenty of numbers to go around in the 717, 412 and 814 areas. "Most of those are good way into the 21st century and we don't foresee having to do anything with those," Duddy said. ----- end of article ----- I've heard of ADDING a "1" to dialing in order to create more NXX possibilities, but ELIMINATING it to create more numbers? How can this be? Not long ago, Southern Bell started to require 1 + 404 for long-distance calls within the same area code. This allowed them to use NXX prefixes which were once "area codes" (i.e. 607, 415...). They were able to get many thousands more numbers. But taking the "1" out???? Sign me "puzzled", Bill Berbenich bill@eedsp.gatech.edu [Moderator's Note: Dear Puzzled -- so am I. If there was ever a dumber article in the papers I have not seen it, except possibly the stuff Joe Abernathy writes about the Internet. Talk about misleading and false information! I wonder how she could have gotten so mixed up in her report? Assuming that it was a 'typographical error' (ha ha, blame it on printer's deviltries!) I guess what she was trying to say was that '1' would be required henceforth in order that area codes could be used as prefixes. I guess ?? Hopefully the paper will run a correction soon, but knowing how most papers operate they will probably brazenly ignore it. Geeze, even I devote entire issues to correcting my mistakes sometimes. PAT]