When 10-digit dialling reached Southern Ontario in 2001
Pagers, faxes and cellphones all needed phone numbers by 2001
The day was coming when there wouldn't be enough telephone numbers for all the devices that required them.
And that meant there were going to be some new numbers to remember for millions of people living in Southern Ontario.
"Soon, phone numbers will be three digits longer," said Peter Mansbridge, host of CBC's The National, on Jan. 4, 2001.
The expansion of the digit count was coming to other Canadian cities too, as reporter Darrow MacIntyre learned.
Not enough 416 numbers
People in the telecommunications industry called it an "alarming trend," he said — the number of "gizmos and gadgets" requiring their own dedicated telephone numbers, from pagers to fax machines to cell phones.
"In each area code there's just over seven million line numbers that can be assigned to customers," said Glen Pilley of the Canadian Numbers Administration in Ottawa. "In Toronto, we're way past the six-million mark."
Enter two new area codes "to absorb the demand for new numbers," said MacIntyre.
"Starting soon, the area now covered by 416 will also be home to the new code 647," he said.
The area covered by 905 would share with the new 289 area code.
"That means people in those areas will have to dial 10 digits instead of seven, even for local calls," he explained.
10 digits in 10 years
Interviewed on the street, a man said he understood there was a need for it, but that getting into the habit of dialling 10 digits might have its frustrations.
"It's the kind of thing you have to face when cities grow," said a woman. "People want more computer-automated things with lots of digits."
MacIntyre said Toronto was the first Canadian city to get "the new system," but that it was in place in "several American cities."
Ten-digit dialling was coming to Vancouver and Montreal, too.
"Telecommunication experts say that within ten years, the whole country will probably be doing it," said MacIntyre.
"There's also a lot of other items that talk on wireless networks that require a phone number," said Kelly Walsh, a program manager with the Canadian Numbering Administrator (CNA), which provides numbering administration service to the telecommunications industry,.
"Things like parking meters and vending machines, things that can communicate for payment, even traffic lights and such can certainly be on a wired network. So there are lots and lots of things taking up phone numbers these days."
