The payphone across from the Metro Motel in Woodside, Queens, is gone gone gone, leaving but 6 metal spikes in the sidewalk at the corner of Queens Boulevard and 73rd Street. Being located near a motel which caters to travelers and transients I expected this payphone to still be here. I was wrong.

This picture, from August, 2000, shows the payphone that was, littered with an empty fast food container the presence of which suggests, perhaps, that someone noshed away at some fries while chatting with a friend.

These pictures, from May, 2010, show the empty space where the payphone used to stand, and the metal spikes on the sidewalk which signal the exact spot at which one formerly could reach out and touch a public phone.

I have never stayed in or set foot in the Metro Motel but the abundance of panicked online reviews suggest that this one-star accommodation (and, perhaps more significantly, the veracity of its reviewers) should be experienced to be believed.