Area Codes

“PUC Rejects ‘Overlays’ for New Area Codes” (Dec. 21) repeats the same tired shibboleth about the cause of the need for more phone numbers. The problem is not, as you say, “population growth combined with the proliferation of fax machines, cellular phones, computer modems, pagers and other devices.” Those uses are certainly growing, but not fast enough to account for problem.

The problem is the needs of (potentially) competitive phone companies. As the phone system is now structured, the exchange portion of a local phone number (the first three digits) is used to determine which local company handles a call. Every start-up competitor seems to think it needs multiple exchanges (blocks of 10,000 numbers) in each geographic area, even though most have yet to sign up their first customers.

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