< Ghosts of Phone Booths Past | The most deserted phone booth in the world... > Payphone Gone: 35th Avenue in Astoria September 02, 2009 This payphone picture was originally posted to my New York City Payphones gallery in the late 1990s. This payphone virtually never worked and was removed many years ago. I did use it, though, when it worked. The last time I tried to use it may have been during the blackout of 2003. I was surprised to find that it (like most payphones I found) did not work. This went against what I thought was the conventional wisdom which said that landline phones (including payphones) should work during power failures. Of course this payphone might simply have been out of service before the blackout. This phone stood between what used to be a convenience store and a bar. I think the bar was the Café Blue Light when this picture was taken but I could be wrong. That space has hosted numerous pubs and social clubs over the years. The Blue Light did occupy the space near this payphone at some point, but today that corner pub is occupied by a wine and cheese bar called Rèst-âü-Ránt (the fancy lettering, I am told, was invoked at random and means nothing). All that remains of this phone today is a square on the sidewalk. The phone was pulled out, and perhaps it was among the casualties in this pile of dead payphones that I spotted nearby at around the same time. < Ghosts of Phone Booths Past | The most deserted phone booth in the world... >