See the lighter coloured bricks on the section of this exchange closest to the corner? Erase that part and insert the beautiful old building in my previous post right there. The darker brick building on the right was built beside the 1911 building to house the new automatic dial equipment in the 1950’s. Sometime after conversion the old building was knocked down then eventually growth or maybe even electronic conversion led to an addition to the automatic exchange building into this area again.
The Fairmont office establish in 1911 (along with the new Highland and Bayview exchanges each in separate areas/ buildings) as a new neighbourhood exchanges to relieve the pressure on the downtown Seymour exchange is shown in the previous picture. Fairmont converted from Operators to 6 digit dialling in the 1950’s as EMerald and DIckens exchanges and a bit later more growth required a 3rd “unit” to be added...EXpress. Later in the 50’s all three exchanges in the building converted to 7 digit dialing and became the...... TRinity Exchange.
Bayview mentioned just above had CEdar and CHerry added to it as 6 digit dial exchanges right after WW2 leaving Bayview as Operators in the same building. SHortages of equipment and massive demand for service meant they had to add dial exchanges without the ability to convert existing manual exchanges. But a bit later Bayview did convert to dial as well remaining as the BAyview Exchange. Until all 3 exchanges in this area converted to 7 digit dialling and became the REgent Exchange.
Highland had been renamed Hastings years earlier and converted straight to 7 digit dial from Operators (no 6 digit dial era for that exchange) as the very last office to convert to dial in Vancouver in November 1960. It became ALpine.
AE_Collector
I see a “?” Beside Bowen Island. It is a local call in Greater Vancouver.
I think that part of the problem with showing “Toll Free calling area” is that it isn't (or at least it wasn’t in the past) a big circle around included exchanges as far as landlines are concerned. Vancouver/Burnaby/Richmond/New Westminster had a defined calling area and could call North/West Van and to Port Moody and Whalley but not to Port Coquitlam or Newton etc. But Port Moody COULD call Port Coquitlam and Whalley but not Newton.
Bowen Island used to be Toll in and Out but then they had a referendum to pay more per month and be able to call the “Greater Vancouver exchange areas”. But it was still toll from Vancouver to Bowen Island! You would pretty much need to look at every exchange individually to see where it can call to. BUT, this was years ago and cell phones arrival began to mess things up as they couldn’t be pinned down as easily. Plus other competitors like Shaw making even larger Toll Free areas for competitive reasons.
Quick... what current exchange used to be BAyview/CEdar/CHerry?
And how about DIckens/EMerald/Express?
AE_Collector
Thanks every one.
While I would not expect it as part of the PM activation process it is too bad that there is not a table for all of Canada to show what Telco City Names are in a Toll Free general area like the Lower Mainland or GTA.
If PM could do this.....maybe the have....if you could enter your postal code for number selection and then all numbers available could show along with the city that they belong to but clearly mark the numbers are all in one Toll Free area.
I don't think too many people know what area the number (CO Code (NXX)) is from when looking at the number. ie. a 604 325 xxxx or 604 327 xxxx number is in the south end of Vancouver.
I guess what I am saying with contacts lists, speed dials, and favourites the xxx in 604-xxx-yyyy that the area identifier has totally been lost in the mind of the users.
