Some Californians set to begin 11-digit dialing

The San Diego Union-Tribune ^ | July 23, 2006 | Dan Laidman

[Mark]

It all started with the damn ZIP Codes. Now the end is near!!

[South40]

We still have speed-dialing/auto-dial.

[SaveTheChief]

We've been doing that in Houston for quite some time. Looks like California is behind the times. :-P

[goldstategop]

They're running out of phone numbers. Hence a new overlay in California.

(Go Israel, Go! Slap 'Em, Down Hezbullies.)

[Alberta's Child]

“Some of the carriers were screaming they didn't have numbers, and here it's been seven years and nobody's been denied a telephone number in the 310 area code.”

There's a reason for that. The dramatic growth in computer-based communication in the last 10 years (e-mail, instant messaging, teleconferencing, etc.) has rendered the fax machine nearly obsolete. This has slowed down the growth in demand for new phone numbers in most metropolitan areas.

I'm not even sure why it's such a big deal for people who don't like this 11-digit dialing anyway. So many people place phone calls these days using pre-set/memory dialing that pressing each individual digit is becoming a thing of the past, too.

[EveningStar]

SoCalPing

[martin_fierro]

Then there's the prestige factor.

Pffft.

[basil]

I think we started doing this in Dallas back in about '98 or '99.

[The Brush]

The outlying Chicago areas had that in the mid 90's

[dalereed]

Totally stupid, they should make all numbers 8 digits and they increase all of them by 10 million.

I remember when they did it in Los Angeles from 6 to 7 digits to increase the numbers.

[Xenalyte]

Wonder why they have to dial 11 digits. Here in Houston, with three area codes (713, 281, and 832), we still only have to dial 10.

[encm(ss)]

I live just 22 miles from the center of Houston and all calls to Houston are long distance. Even the next town, only 5 miles away is long distance.

[wagglebee]

Consumer activists and politicians mobilized against the plan, however, and in 1999 the California Public Utilities Commission voted 3-2 to halt it. At the state's behest, phone companies found other ways to conserve numbers. Typical of the California leftists to force private corporations to accommodate them.

[Berosus]

*Yawn*

We've had 10-digit dialing in Orlando since 1999, when we got our second area code (321) to join the previously existing 407. I thought California was supposed to be ahead of the rest of the country in everything.

[Alberta's Child]

You might have three area codes, but if you don't need to dial 11 digits all the time this means that these area codes still have some kind of geographic basis. In places where area codes are "overlayed," a new area code is introduced that includes places that already have their own area code -- and the new area code is used for all new phones from that point on. So a home with two different phone numbers could theoretically have two different area codes for its phones.

[HostileTerritory]

I have to dial the 1 first from landlines but can do straight 10-digit dialing from a cell phone.

[Alberta's Child]

It's worth noting that a phone call isn't necessarily "long distance" just because you have to dial an area code. Between local and long distance calls there is another category called "regional" calls, which are outside your immediate area but not far enough away to involve a separate phone carrier.

The opposite is also true. There are some rural parts of the country where an area code covers an enormous region, and many calls within that area code can be "long distance" if they are made to points that are far away.

[TankerKC]

Growing up in Colorado in the 70s, we only dialed 4 numbers. Many folks still had party lines.

[Cobra64]

Californians to be required to dial 11 digits each time they pick up the phone...

Brrrring... "Hello? Hold on, I have to dial eleven digits."

Communication skills today are atrocious.