The North American Numbering Plan was designed to provide direct dialing of long-distance telephone calls. It began with a reliably simple set of numbers. But since the peak has increased in the number of telephones in recent years, it has turned into a complicated and tangled mess.
The system provides unique telephone numbers for all phones throughout the United States and its territories, Canada, Bermuda and 17 Caribbean countries. The numbers consist of 10 digits, for example 123-456-7890, where 123 is the area code, 456 is the exchange, and 7890 is the subscriber number.
201 was the first area code introduced in New Jersey in 1951. In the 50s it was decided to keep the numbers simple, so they would not have to dial numbers for a very long time using the rotary telephones of that era. Thus, the average number has always been either 0 or 1. At that time, it was thought that this system would be enough to provide region codes for all phones until the 21st century.
Up until the end of the 80s, calls were recognized over long distances if the 2nd digit of the dialed number was 0 or 1, and routed accordingly. If the second digit was not 0 or 1, the call will be redirected to the local number. This meant that the seven-digit number could not have a second digit of 0 or 1, or that would be an error for a long distance call.
This restriction on telephone numbers was fixed when long-distance dialers had to use the initial number 1, therefore allow local telephone switches to use numbers such as 202-6789. If the initial 1 was not, it would be recognized as a local number.
At about the same time, in the early 1990s, a rapid increase in demand for telephone numbers began. There were two main reasons for this:
- Extensive use of faxes, modems and mobile phones.
- Deregulation of local telephone services.
Whenever a new local telephone operator was opened, a unique exchange was assigned to it, as a result of which a block of 10,000 numbers was reserved. This has led to an inadequate use of regional codes, since most of the new Baby Bells did not have so many subscribers.
When adding new codes, two methods were introduced:
- The splits. The area of the existing area code is divided into two units, keeping the old code, and the other FORCED - to the new code. For example, in 2003, regional code 941 in southern Florida separated its southern region from using the new code 239. Residents of the new region were given one year to make changes - and, of course, change their stationery to show the
- Overlays The second code is added to an area that already has an area code. In this case, since there is more than one code in one region, residents MUST dial 10 digits to reach ANY number. Ironically, this means that if you live in such a region, your neighbor may have a different area code!
Since 1996, when local number portability was introduced, the situation has become so out of control that now the area code contains almost no information about the location of the phone. Here are just two examples from my own experience here in the US Virgin Islands.
- I have a friend who moved here from Savannah, GA a few years ago. She bought her a cell phone and still uses the same code 912 that she used before moving. This means that anyone who calls her from the Virgin Islands must dial a 10-digit number and, if they use a landline, must pay for the call.
- Two years ago I bought Magic Jack, which connects to my computer and uses the Internet to place and receive phone calls. There are currently no Magic Jack phone numbers in the Virgin Islands, so my phone number has an area code of 540, presumably located in Culpeper, Virginia. Not only is this confusing, ”a friend asked me when I moved to Virginia? - but the locals using the hospital must pay to call me.
So who do we blame for this monstrous system and what can we do about it? I don't think anyone specifically caused this. It was quite possible to predict the future of telecommunications, when the system was created at the initial stage.
And at this late stage, I do not think that there is anything that can be done to clean it. One good thing, though ... We no longer need to wait until the dial on the rotating phone clicks every time a number is entered.
