Not all outdoor payphones in New York will be replaced by LinkNYC. It looks like a quantity of them will simply disappear, replaced by nothing but fresh concrete. I spotted two examples of this last week, then a day later this one at 36th Avenue and 31st Street. This clamshell-enclosed payphone, free of advertising, got a decent amount of usage from what I could tell. Its number — RAvenswood 9-9343, or 718-729-9343 — remains listed on this page along with numerous other non-existing payphones of yore. Here it stood in all its slightly-tilted splendor:
If a LinkNYC kiosk ever replaces this payphone it probably will not happen any time soon. This layer of concrete creates something of an obstacle to accessing the sidewalk’s underbelly where CityBridge would lay that gigabit fiber. Still, nothing says they can’t tear up this piece of sidewalk months or years from now and put in place the necessary infrastructure for a kiosk.
As typical of the LinkNYC rollout no heads up of any kind went to the community that this payphone, which had occupied this spot for decades, would soon disappear. We can check nyc.gov for clues on where LinkNYC kiosks should appear, but no word comes down warning payphone users of impending payphone vanishment.
Here is one photo I tweeted in 2017 of an ACTION SHOT showing this payphone in use. The woman, obviously a traveler, talked on this phone for a good long time. She would not be totally out of luck if she visited this area again expecting to connect with someone via payphone. Two working phones remain alive in this area, but for how long only the City knows.
Action shot. Spotted someone using what is actually a pretty popular #payphone at 36th Ave. and 31st Street in Astoria/LIC. pic.twitter.com/NqS3eDrCUj
— Payphone Project (@payphonenews) October 14, 2017
I don’t know what to make of the removal of two payphones at 61st Street near First Avenue in Manhattan. The phones got whacked and the signature orange pylon promising free Wi-Fi soon replaced it. But this location, outside the One Lenox dining establishment, does not appear in any of the datasets at NYC.gov listing future kiosk locations with permit applications either approved or pending. I wouldn’t think CityBridge expects to get away with installing kiosks without permits. So unless someone files permits in the future then nothing more than a layer of cement should replace the excised payphones.
