On Monday, May 23rd, NYC took away the last payphone. Why, you may ask? According to CNBC, “The city began removing street payphones in 2015 to replace them with the LinkNYC kiosks.” There are about 2,000 kiosks across the city as of right now. 

    Years before electronics came about, people would always use payphones to communicate, but in response to smart phones, the population of the payphones went down. It was very common to see people using payphones before technology, but now the only thing people need is Wi-Fi. Even before any source of electronics, people still used the payphones. 6,000 phones were removed when LinkNYC was brought and was announced to the public.

    “Just like we transitioned from the horse and buggy to the automobile and from the automobile to the airplane, the digital evolution has progressed from payphones to high-speed Wi-Fi kiosks to meet the demands of our rapidly changing daily communications needs,” Commissioner Matthew Fraser said, CNBC’s quote. The last payphone was located on the southwest corner of 17th Avenue and 50th Street. According to the FCC, there are less than 100,000 payphones left in the US today.

    Taking away payphones wasn’t the best option one could make. There are many people who don’t own phones, yes having kiosks is also a good idea, but having about 2,000 is too much. Life has definitely changed due to technology and studies, but some people still remain old-fashioned.

    The last public payphone will be displayed at the Museum of the City of New York as part of an exhibit, looking back at how life used to look like in the city before computers.