Seventeen years ago, news swept through New Hampshire that galvanized opposition from every corner of the state. People howled in outrage as they scrambled to protect an aspect of Granite State life they held near and dear: the area code.
Area code 603 has been the lead-in to all telephone numbers in New Hampshire since area codes were developed in 1947. It is so ingrained that at least 134 companies use it as part of their name, according to listings at the New Hampshire Corporation Division, ranging from a lounge in Nashua to a Concord basketball training firm to a microbrewery in Londonderry.
“Everybody who comes in knows 603 is our area code. The connection is immediate,” said David Moses, a cashier at Capital Beverages on South Main Street in Concord, as he showed the store’s selection of beers from 603 Brewery.
Happily, that connection will remain. The New Hampshire Public Utilities Commission said Tuesday that the organization that oversees telephone numbers has confirmed that 603 will remain the state’s only area code for at least another 16 years.
This is actually an improvement. The last time the North American Numbering Plan Administrator, or NANPA, discussed the issue, it said 603 might run out of room by 2020, but on Monday, it said the area code could remain solo until 2032.
The reason for the extension is technical, as is the reason why 603 was imperiled even though it contains far more phone numbers than New Hampshire has people. After all, between 111-1111 and 999-9999 there are almost 10 million possible numbers, surely enough for 1.4 million residents.
The shortage stems largely from the way the telephone system was built decades ago.
Landline phones were built on circuit-switched networks, in which each phone call occupies an entire line all the way from one person to another. Originally human operators made sure the line was connected end-to-end, putting the right plugs into the right switchboard holes, but as long-distance networks expanded and automatic switches were developed, a new system was needed so machines would know where to direct out-of-state calls.
That system turned out to be three-digit area codes, which were assigned throughout the U.S. and Canada by geography as part of the post-World War II boom.
The codes were handed out to places based on population, with bigger places getting codes that added up to fewer digits as a way to minimize total usage of the network. New York City got the best area code of 212, which totals up to only five, because it was biggest city; then came Chicago (312) and Los Angeles (213). (No code could start with a “1”, which was used to signal a long-distance call.)
New Hampshire’s code, 603, totals 19 digits (counting 0 as 10), indicating how small our population is. Vermont’s code of 802, totaling 20 digits, indicates that it is even smaller.
As a side note, the fact that the middle digit is “0” also indicates something: that our area code covers an entire state. States with multiple area codes got numbers with “1” in the middle, such as Boston’s 617.
Inside each area code, seven-digit phone numbers were handed out based on three-digit exchanges that covered smaller areas, such as 225 in Concord, followed by four digits. And this is where the problem arose.
Four digits equals 9,999 possible phone numbers for each exchange, but because of limits with switching systems located in central offices, those numbers had to be assigned all-or-nothing, even if there weren’t 9,999 customers waiting to get a new phone. As a result, many phone numbers were unused, sitting vacant because not enough customers existed within a given exchange.
PUC staff found methods to better divvy up exchanges as part of transition to digital switching.
By 2010, the system had improved so much that NANPA said we were safe through 2015; the following year, they said we were safe through 2020. And now we’re safe through at least 2032.