A pay telephone on a busy Detroit street corner could once net $200 a week in just coins. But that was 30 years ago.
These days, Greg Andrick is lucky to find $5 or $6 in a pay phone's change box every couple months when making his service rounds. His company, Great Lakes Telephone in Ferndale, once operated more than6,000 rectangular metal pay phones across southeast Michigan. Now it has less than 20, all in Oakland County government buildings andparks.
"It's really sad. This used to be quite a booming business," said Andrick, who is alsopresident of the still-existing Michigan Pay Telephone Association. "It shriveled up and went slowly away."
Like the typewriter and transistor radio, the pay phone is a once-ubiquitous facet of life whose convenience and business model was outmoded by technology.
Detroit once teemedwith working pay phones. The common locations were inside bars and outside gas stations, party stores, bus stops and street corners with foot traffic. Across the state of Michigan, there were roughly60,000 pay phonesin the mid-1980s, according to the pay telephoneassociation.
Now there are 1,400 pay phones registered within the stateoutside of prisons, although it's unknown how many of these work. There are still 14 listed pay phone carrier companies.
The Free Press recently scouted the city for these coin-operated artifacts. The search turned up dozens of battered pay phones in various states of decay. Only a handful of them still produced a dial tone.
Some phones were rusty and missing mouthpieces, earpieces or both. A few had lost their entire handset and had naked wires sticking out. One phone in the old Cass Corridor was thoroughly mutilated after someone snatched its change box and ripped out the dial pad and cradle hook.
Working phones were found inside, such as at the Greyhound bus station on 1001 Howard Street, the 36th District Court building near Greektown and at MotorCity Casino Hotel. The Detroit Metro Airport reports having about 200 working pay phones, which generated $15,476 in commissions last year for the airport.
Scott Hunter, 21, of Jackson, was spotted this monthin the act of making a pay phone call in the Greyhound station. His cell phone had lost its charge and he needed tocall his grandmother in Daytona Beach, Fla., with news that his bus would arrive late, he said.
Not accustomed to pay phones, Hunter said he lost 50 cents putting quarters before first picking up the receiver.
"I was trying to remember how to work it," he said.
Hunter's secondattempt was more successful, and he paid 75 cents for a roughly 1-minute call to Florida.
Terminal decline
Andrick, the Michigan Pay Telephone Association president, said that in its heyday, pay phone operators typically paid commissions to the owner of a location where one of its pay phones was installed. This arrangement made sense for the pay phone operators because they got a percentage of the revenue from each call.
A 1984 Free Press article described how some high-grossing pay phones in the area netted $500 a month, about $1,150 in today’s dollars.
Pay phones were regulated by the Michigan Public Service Commission, which had recently approved an increase from 20 to 25 cents in Michigan Bell’s charge for local pay phone calls.
The Detroit area’s pay phone business was beginning to enter a terminal decline by the late 1990s, Andrick said.
His company stopped offering its commissions to phone location owners once the phones slipped below revenue thresholds. Eventually, the company started charging for its phones to recoup the maintenance and service costs. The current rate for a pay phone is $60 per month.
“It got to, OK, if you really want this pay phone here, you’re going to have to pay me to keep it here,” Andrick said.
Pay phone industry officials have also attributed the fast demise of pay phones in urban areas to the Federal Communications Commission’s Lifeline program, sometimes called the “Obama phone” program, that offers free cell phones to low-income people. Sign-up tents with big signs advertising these phones can occasionally be seen near busy intersections in parts of Detroit and Highland Park.
“That was certainly the nail in the coffin,” Andrick said.
Calls from prison
One carrier, Connecticut-based Frontier Communications, has about 200 pay phones across Michigan that are in convenience stores, hospitals, restaurants, gas stations, campgrounds and one at the Michigan International Speedway, said company representative Andrea Fast.
"Not everyone has a cell phone, so pay phones do come in handy if you need to call 911," she said. "And if you are at a campground and can't charge your cell phone and need to call in an emergency, pay phones would be helpful."
Among the more frequent users of pay phones are prison inmates. There are 2,603 pay phones spread across 32 state prisons and the Detroit Detention Center, said Chris Gautz, spokesman for the Michigan Department of Corrections. The phones used by inmates are different from regular pay phones and look like stainless steel bricks.
Prisoners make about 1.1 million calls a month and are permitted to talk for no longer than 15 minutes per call. The basic charge on a prison phone is 20 cents per minute for collect calls and pre-paid calls.
Andrick made a visit to theOakland County Jail earlier this year to empty change boxes and permanently remove a regular pay phone from a lobby area that was no longer getting use.
Fifteen years agohe could have resold that phone. But the secondary market for pay phones is long gone, so he had to junk it.
"Once we take them out, we send them to the scrap heap," said Andrick, whose Pay Telephone Association is considering disbanding. "There's no further use for them from our standpoint."
Pay Phone Facts:
- There are about1,400 regularpay phones left in Michigan. (Yet not all work)
- There were anestimated 60,000 pay phones in Michigan in mid-1980s.
- A high-grossing pay phone could net $500 in change a month in the early 1980s.
- A typical pay phone today can get$5 to $6 in change every couple months.
- There are 2,603 prison pay phones spread across 32 state prisons and the Detroit Detention Center.
- Prisoners make about 1.1 million calls a month and can talk for no longer than 15 minutes per call.
Source: Free Press reporting.
Which stateloves pay phones the most?
Hawaii had the most pay phones per capitain 2014 of the 50 states and District of Columbia. For touristswith deadcell phone batteries, there is nobetter placeto be.
Pay phones per 100,000 population:
1. Hawaii - 296 phones
2. New York - 142 phones
3. West Virginia - 127 phones
4. Nebraska - 93 phones
5. Nevada - 73 phones
48. Michigan - 20 phones
Source: Data from National Payphone Clearinghouse and Wireline Competition Bureau, analyzed by Detroit Free Press data reporter Kristi Tanner.
The last pay phones of Detroit
Cass Corridor twins— Cass and Henry
The first pay phone picturedhas taken a lot of abuse. Its coin box was stolen and someone busted its dial pad and cradle hook.It is one of two pay phones outside a party store on Cass, not far from the future Detroit hockey arena and entertainment district.
The secondphone pictured is in slightly better shape, but missing its ear and mouth pieces.A nearby resident who goes by Sweet Water Willysaid both phones have been dead for about five years."They might as well come take them off the wall, it don't make sense they don't work."
Red twins outside Shamrock gas station—Woodward Avenue
There were once two red payphones outside the Shamrock gas station at Woodward and Clairmount near a bus stop.
There is now just one—and it no longer makes calls. The phone's receiver was found upside down in its cradle on a recent afternoon with half of the mouth piece chewed off.
Dojo pay phone—Warren Avenue
This phone is between a martial arts dojo and a coney island on Warren. Itis intact, but there is no dial tone.
Insurance storefront phone — 7 mile and Schaefer
This phone is outside an insurance storefront. It'sunclear why the receiver cord appears to be going inside the building. A man inside the office said the phone doesn't belong to the businessand he didn't know what was going on with the cord. Passersby have been treatingthe pay phone's kiosk as a trash receptacle.
Uncovered phone — Hamilton and Ford
Something strange happened to this pay phone's cover. It is now completely at the mercy of the elements. No dial tone. The phone is outside a closed barber shop and a working bus stop.
Nature phone— West McNichols
Nature has reclaimedterritory around this pay phone outside a former beauty supply and cellular phone & pager store. There is no more kiosk or receiver.
Shopping strip phone — Woodward
This sidewalk pay phone is in front of a Woodward shopping strip with a Dollar General, Subway and Cricket. The receiver was found off its cradle with broken mouth and ear pieces. A white streamer was curiously wound around its cord and fluttered in the wind.
• Bike shop phone — Cass
This former pay phone is outside The Hub bike shop on Cass. After the phone stopped working four or five years ago, the shop's mechanics had the idea to repurpose the kiosk as a bike repair stand. They even created a pink wrench sign for the top of the kiosk, replacing the traditional blue pay phone icon.
"Before it was just an empty box, but now people can fix their bikes," said bike mechanic Yasmine Abu-Soud. "It's kind of annoying because sometimes people put their Faygo bottles and beer junk on it, but that changed a little once we put agarbage can out."
• Giant handset kiosk — Fort and Cabacier
The phone itself has been picked apart, but this kiosk in the shape of a giant red handset is still there. It'slocated along a sidewalk near a parking lot and a coney island.
• Working triplets— Frank Murphy Hall of Justice
This trio of pay phones is at the entrance to the Frank Murphy Hall of Justicein downtown. Because cell phone use is restricted in the court building, they serve a captive audience. All three phones were in working condition last week.
* Graypay phone — Cass and Temple
This pay phone is mounted outsidea vacant building at Cass and Temple in the Cass Corridor, not far from the Masonic Temple. Curiously, the phonereceived a fresh coat of gray paint this year along with the building.
* Fine Arts Theater phone — Woodward Avenue
This payphone is located inside the oldFine Arts Theater at 2952Woodward. The theater has been closed for years. Aside fromits missing change box, the phone is in decent condition buthasno dial tone.
