Phone Booths Are Mostly Dead, But Not All Dead, In Spain

Is the phone booth a thing of art? Of commerce? Or is it just a piece of trash from an older age – a piece of trash no one, including the phone companies, wants to deal with? While Spaniards use their mobiles to call someone around 100 million times a day, and use WhatsApp for messages 125 million times a day, the number of phone calls from or between pay phones is a low 6,180. And then there are the reasons to use them: The authorities say it’s “to send a threat, claim a debt in an unorthodox way or for a date between lovers or adulterers who must hide their relationship. The advantage of the phone booth over the mobile is that the calls leave no trace.” – El País