In a small town at the foot of Mount Rainier, about 45 miles Southeast of Seattle, the views are spectacular, but cell phone reception is spotty.
Susan Reiter has had a landline at her home in Enumclaw, Washington, since 1978. Reiter says power goes out several times a year, usually due to high winds and other weather events. But she says the landline always works, making it the best option if she needs to call 911 in an emergency.
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“There are people in rural America who need this service,” says Reiter, 77. “Maybe that’s not a huge number, but it’s a safety issue for people.”
With the rise of mobile phones, the number of landline users has plummeted, and the days of 19th-century technology appear to be numbered. Providers like AT&T are looking to get out of business by switching customers to mobile or home phone service over broadband connections. But for the millions of people still stuck with their copper-based landline phones, new alternatives are either unavailable, too expensive, or unreliable when it matters most: in emergencies.
Only a quarter of adults in the United States still have landlines, and only 5 percent say they rely mostly or exclusively on them, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. The largest group using landlines is those aged 65 and over. Meanwhile, more than 70 percent of adults use cordless phones only.
Copper lines used for traditional landlines carry electricity through cables, so the phone will work during a power outage as long as it is wired or charged. Landlines are separate from cellular and broadband networks and are not affected by outages; This makes them a necessary support point in rural areas. Many of the same areas have poor cellular or internet coverage.
“In three, four, maybe five years, many states will say, ‘Okay, if you, the phone company, can show that there is functional alternative service, discontinuing service may be permissible,'” says Academy and Professor Emeritus Rob Frieden. Pennsylvania State University Department of Telecommunications and Law.
AT&T recently asked the California Public Utilities Commission to end its obligation to provide landline service in some parts of the state. The Federal Communications Commission, which must approve a request to terminate service, said it had not received a request from AT&T.
“In California, we spend more than a billion dollars a year to maintain our legacy network and services, which are used by 5 percent of households today, and that’s declining rapidly,” Susan Johnson, AT&T’s head of wireline transformation, said in an email. “This is as efficient as cooling an entire high-rise building whose residents only occupy one floor in the summer heat.”
Hundreds of California residents called into the CPUC’s public meetings last week to share their views at AT&T’s request. The vast majority said Maintaining landline service was a security issue; Due to power outages, wildfires, and flooding, landlines were the only way to reach 911 or get information about evacuations. Many said eliminating landlines would disproportionately affect seniors, people with disabilities and low-income people.
Callers, especially the elderly, also said they could not get or afford reliable cell phone or internet service where they lived. Some have trouble learning to use new technology or simply don’t like cell phones. One woman called cell phones “a decline of civilization as we know it.”
Despite the demand, AT&T says copper landline customers are not currently being disrupted and people can still sign up for a new landline. But like other landline companies, it hopes to convert these customers to alternatives.
One option is cellular service, but coverage is not consistent for people in less populated parts of the country and there is a risk of outages. AT&T’s cellular outage on Feb. 22 left millions of customers across the U.S. without service for hours, according to the FCC, which is investigating the incident.
Another alternative is VoIP, or voice over internet protocol, telephone service. It is a phone line carried over the internet rather than copper, and can be used with a traditional home phone, wired or wireless.
That’s how 39-year-old Liz Bleakley runs her business, Good Hands Creamery. In her former life, when she worked in health care in Atlanta, Bleakley only used a cell phone. But three years ago, when she moved to the Windsor, Vermont, area with her husband to become a raw-milk cheese maker, she realized her cell phone wasn’t going to cut it.
“We had the wonderful experience of moving into our house and looking at our cell phones, and then we had the terrifying moment: There’s no bar,” Bleakley said in a home phone interview after losing cell service. “It’s terrible; your calls get dropped and you have to plan times and situations when you can continue talking to someone.”
In a rural, mountainous area where snowstorms are common, he wanted to have an option for emergencies and conducting business. Instead of getting a regular landline, Bleakley signed up for wired internet and got a VoIP number.
The Biden administration has committed tens of billions of dollars to expand broadband service in the United States; This can help people get rid of copper lines. But even if everyone had reliable access, issues like power outages, bugs, and affordability would still exist.
Some hardwired phone lines come with backup batteries that can last a few hours in the event of a power outage, but when power is out for days the home will need another option, such as a generator.
Victor Lund, 57, has a more reliable, if expensive, backup plan. The technology consultant from Arroyo Grande, California, bought satellite phones for his family. Lund says the tiny devices look like an old Nokia feature phone with an antenna and can maintain a charge for months or a year when turned off. He prepaid $300 for 200 minutes and hasn’t had to use it yet.
“There are a lot of places in California where cellphones don’t work, in what I call civilization,” said Lund, who regularly travels the state by quad bike and explores.
Other options appear regularly. Apple has added satellite-connected emergency response service to the iPhone 14 in 2022, and it’s not yet charging for the feature, but it may be in the future.
For people who’ve had a landline for decades, the promise of new technology can’t compete with the security of something that’s been working for that long.
On their 123-acre timber farm in Longview, Wash., Lisa and Robert Sudar have all the options. When they walk up a nearby hill, they have working cell phones, internet access, VoIP telephony and Starlink satellite service. And in a drawer in their hallway is an old Princess phone connected to a landline; The only phone that works during a power outage.
“Having landlines gives us great security as a population,” said 70-year-old Robert Sudar. “It’s another way to communicate with people when the power goes out, and I think it’s a national security issue.”
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