A telephone booth, telephone kiosk, telephone call box, telephone box or public call box[1] [2] is a tiny structure furnished with a payphone and designed for a telephone user's convenience; typically the user steps into the booth and closes the booth door while using the payphone inside.
In the United States and Canada, "telephone booth" (or "phone booth") is the commonly used term for the structure, while in the Commonwealth of Nations (particularly the United Kingdom and Australia), it is a "phone box".[3]
Such a booth usually has lighting, a door to provide privacy, and windows to let others know if the booth is in use. The booth may be furnished with a printed directory of local telephone numbers, and in a formal setting, such as a hotel, may be furnished with paper and pen and even a seat. An outdoor booth may be made of metal and plastic to withstand the elements and heavy use, while an indoor booth (known as a silence cabinet) may have more elaborate design and furnishings.[4] Most outdoor booths feature the name and logo of the telephone service provider.
The world's first telephone box called "Fernsprechkiosk", was opened on 12 January 1881 at Potsdamer Platz, Berlin.[5] To use it, one had to buy paper tickets called Telefonbillet which allowed for a few minutes of talking time. In 1899, it was replaced by a coin-operated telephone.
William Gray is credited with inventing the coin payphone in the United States in 1889, and George A. Long was its developer.[6]
In the UK, the creation of a national network of telephone boxes commenced in 1920, beginning with the K1 model which was made of concrete; however, the city of Kingston upon Hull is noted for having its individual phone service, Kingston Communications, with cream coloured phone boxes, as opposed to classic royal red in the rest of Britain. The Post Office was forced into allowing a less strident grey with red glazing bars scheme for areas of natural and architectural beauty. Ironically, some of these areas that have preserved their telephone boxes have now painted them red.
Starting in the 1970s, pay telephones were less commonly placed in booths in the United States. In many cities where they were once common, telephone booths have now been almost completely replaced by non-enclosed pay phones. In the United States, this replacement was caused, at least in part, by an attempt to make the pay telephones more accessible to disabled people. However, in the United Kingdom, telephones remained in booths more often than the non-enclosed setup. Although still fairly common, the number of phone boxes has declined sharply in Britain since the late 1990s due to the rise in use of mobile phones.
Many locations that provide pay-phones mount the phones on kiosks rather than in booths—this relative lack of privacy and comfort discourages lengthy calls in high-demand areas such as airports.
Special equipment installed in some telephone booths allows a caller to use a computer, a portable fax machine, or a telecommunications device for the deaf.
The Jabbrrbox, an enclosed structure for installation in open plan offices, was inspired by the telephone booth.
The ubiquity of the phone booth led to its depiction in fiction. In comic books published by DC Comics, the telephone booth is occasionally the place where reporter Clark Kent discards his street clothing and transforms into the costumed superhero Superman. Some films and television series have reused or parodied this plot device.[7] The 1965–1970 television series Get Smart used a phone booth, among other devices, as a secure means of entering CONTROL headquarters.[8] The 2002 film Phone Booth takes place almost entirely in a telephone booth; a 2023 retrospective article notes that "the obsolescence is to the film's advantage."[9]
The 1986 comedy film Clockwise features John Cleese's character vandalising a phone in a booth in frustration after it malfunctions.[10] The scene played on the public perception in Britain at the time that telephone booths were frequently out of order.[11]
Phone booths have been subject to wireless surveillance by law enforcement. For example, the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case of Katz v. United States involved the Constitutional question of whether the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) could install a listening device outside of the booth.[12]
The increasing use of mobile phones has led to a decreased demand for payphones, while the increasing use of laptops is leading to a new kind of service: in 2003, service provider Verizon announced that it would begin offering wireless computer connectivity in the vicinity of its phone booths in Manhattan. In 2006, the Verizon Wi-Fi telephone booth service was discontinued in favor of the more expensive Verizon Wireless' EVDO system.[13]
Wireless access is motivating telephone companies to place wireless stations at locations that have traditionally hosted telephone booths, but stations are also appearing in new kinds of locations such as libraries, cafés, and trains. Phone booths have been slowly disappearing with the growth in use of mobile phones.
A rise in vandalism has prompted several companies to manufacture simpler booths with extremely durable pay phones.
Pay phones may still be used by mobile/cellular phone users if their phone become unusable, is stolen, or for other emergency uses. These uses may make the complete disappearance of pay phones in the near future less likely.
Under the Universal Service Obligation, the Government of Australia legally requires Telstra to ensure standard phone services and payphones are "reasonably accessible to all people in Australia". Some communities, particularly in remote regional areas, rely on payphones, as well as people who do not have access to a mobile phone.
At their peak in the early 1990s, there were more than 80,000 public phone boxes across the country. By June 30, 2016, according to the Australian Communications & Media Authority there were about 24,000 payphones across Australia. On August 3, 2021, with 15,000 public phones remaining across Australia, Telstra announced that all calls to fixed line and mobile phones within Australia from public phones would become free of charge, and that it had no plans to further eliminate public phones.[14]
In Belgium, majority state-owned telco Belgacom took the last remaining phone booths out of service in June 2015.[15]
In June 2021 the last phone booth in Czechia was closed and dismantled.[16] [17]
In December 2017 the last three public telephone booths in Denmark had their telephones removed.[18] They were situated in the town of Aarhus.
By 2007, Finnet companies and TeliaSonera Finland had discontinued their public telephones, and the last remaining operator Elisa Oyj did so early the same year.[19]
According to Orange CEO, Stéphane Richard, there were only 26 public phone booths[20] still operating in France as of 2021. The "Macron law" of 2015 ended Orange mandatory maintenance of a public phone booth network, its decline in use being caused by the cell phones era. These are, by law, maintained in rural area where there is no cell phone service. Consequently, they are removed once the area is properly covered by at least one mobile phone operator.
Eir, the Universal Service Obligation carrier with regard to payphones, has been systematically removing payphones which fall under the minimum requirement for retention, of a rolling average of one minute of usage a day over six months. [21]
As of June 2019, 456 locations retained payphones (with none in the entirety of County Leitrim); this was down from 1,320 in March 2014.[22]
In May 2023 AGCOM established that TIM no longer has the obligation to guarantee the availability of telephone booths, with the exception of "places of social importance", such as hospitals (with at least ten beds), prisons, and barracks with at least fifty occupants. TIM will also be able to decommission booths in mountain refuges, while ensuring access to the mobile telephone network. AGCOM declared that 99.2% of public telephones are already covered by a mobile network with at least 2G technology (May 2023). In September 2023 over 90,000 booths which do not fall into the above-mentioned exceptions began being removed.[23]
In 2004, Jordan became the first country in the world not to have telephone booths generally available. The mobile/cellular phone penetration in that country has become so high that telephone booths had been rarely used for years. The two private payphone service companies, namely ALO and JPP, closed down.[24]
The last functioning phone box in Norway was taken out of service in June 2016. However, 100 phone boxes have been preserved around the country and are protected under cultural heritage laws.[25]
The first telephone booth in Sweden was erected in 1890. In 1981 there were 44,000,[26] but by 2013, only 1,200 remained, with the removal of the last one in 2015.[27] A survey showed that in 2013, only 1% of the population in Sweden had used one during the previous year.[27]
See main article: K series telephone box. The red telephone kiosk is recognised as a British icon and the BT Group still hold intellectual property rights in the designs of many of the telephone boxes, including registered trademark rights.[28] BT is steadily removing public telephone kiosks from the streets of the UK. It is permitted to remove a kiosk without consultation provided that there is another kiosk within 400m (1,300feet) walking distance. In other cases, it is required to comply with Ofcom rules in consultation with the local authority.[29] Some decommissioned red telephone boxes have been converted for other uses with the permission of BT Group, such as housing small community libraries or automated external defibrillators.[30] [31]
Beginning in the 1990s, many large cities began instituting restrictions on where pay phones could be placed, under the belief that they facilitated crime. In 1999, there were approximately 2 million phone booths in the United States.[32] Only five percent of those remained in service by 2018. In 2008, AT&T began withdrawing pay phone support citing profitability, and a few years later Verizon also left the pay phone market.[33] In 2015, a phone booth in Prairie Grove, Arkansas was placed on the National Register of Historic Places.[34] New phone booth installations do sometimes occur, including the installation of a phone booth at Eaton Rapid's city hall.[35]
In 2018, about a fifth of America's 100,000 remaining pay phones were in New York, according to the FCC. Only four phone booths remain in New York City, all on Manhattan's Upper West Side; the rest have been converted into WiFi hotspots. Incoming calls are no longer available, and outgoing calls are now free. In February 2020, the city confirmed that despite a plan to remove dozens of pay phones, the iconic booths would continue to be maintained.[36] [37]
Many telephone boxes in the United Kingdom are now used for advertisements, bearing posters, with the development of "StreetTalk" by JCDecaux.[38] This is in addition to the ST6 public telephone introduced in 2007 which is designed to feature a phone on one side and a JCDecaux-owned advertising space on the otherside. The advertising pays for the cost of maintaining the phone.
In 2018, the UK Local Government Association drew attention to "Trojan" telephone boxes. These are telephone boxes whose main purpose is advertising. A loophole in planning law allows these to be erected without planning permission and the LGA is seeking to close this loophole.[39]