Payphones Past

Payphone News

The RFK/Triborough Bridge’s LifeNet Phone: It’s Still Not There.

A few years ago I contacted New York City's Metropolitan Transit Authority to inquire about a curious piece of signage…

11 years ago

The Forgotten World of the Payphone Hustler

The days of the "payphone hustler" at New York's Port Authority Bus Terminal are long gone, but their memory survives…

11 years ago

All Quiet On The Payphone Front

Lack of content updates at The Payphone Project site belie activities going on behind the scenes. A variety of other…

11 years ago

Pay Phone Hidden Inside a Jersey City Business

Val Vashon writes again with this payphone discovery in Jersey City, New Jersey. While walking to the laundromat in Jersey…

11 years ago

1943: WOrth 2-8354, Rotary Dial Payphone

Shorpy.com features a 1943 photo of a young sailor using a rotary-dial payphone marked with a phone number in the…

12 years ago

Val Vashon: Payphones Across America

Val Vashon writes: "I had to drive a TV satellite truck from Washington State to New Jersey for Superbowl coverage…

12 years ago

Glamour Job: MTA Subway Payphone Inspector

I spotted this gentleman some months ago, performing a job I did not think actually existed. A Metropolitan Transit Authority…

12 years ago

Surrender This Envelope To Get A $10 Rate

Manhattan payphones are being vandalized with stickers bearing a seemingly mysterious message. What does it mean?

12 years ago

Chicago’s Vanishing Pay Telephones (2007)

This story, from Chicago's WGN television, is from 6 years ago but in many ways it could have been produced…

12 years ago

“left to twirl a gap-toothed dial in some phone-booth”

"left to twirl a gap-toothed dial in some phone-booth". From "Postscriptum", by Joseph Brodsky.

12 years ago