In the iPhone age, pay phones often get more use from graffiti artists and people with an appetite for destruction than citizens needing to make a call. “There are phones in disrepair that are making these street corners look abandoned,” says Ward 13 Councilman Kevin Kelley. “They have not been maintained by the companies that own them, and they’ve become an eyesore.” So in September, Kelley introduced legislation that allows the city’s director of finance to pay for the removal of the roughly 550 phones that remain standing outside boarded-up gas stations and long-abandoned doughnut shops. Set to begin in April, the $200,000 project targets the biggest eyesores first and could be completed by the end of the year. Before the cityscape is stripped of these Reagan-era relics, we pay tribute to some of the last remaining pay phones.
Midtown Gulf Gas Station
5400 Euclid Ave., Cleveland
Peter Pan Donuts & Restaurant (Closed)
14636 Euclid Ave., East Cleveland
Gas Express & Clark Food Mart (Closed)
West 38th Street and Clark Avenue, Cleveland
Family Dollar
12107 St. Clair Ave., Cleveland
Sun Rise Food (Closed)
4757 Lorain Ave., Cleveland
Rally's
14421 Euclid Ave., Cleveland
We Pay Tribute To The Last Of The Pay Phones
As Cleveland gears up to tear them down, we salute these fallen soldiers of communication.
