Erie Lackawanna Calling

It shouldn’t be surprising that this hub of transportation (commuter rail, light rail, buses, and ferry) that is the Erie Lackawanna station, still has working phones. If you’re cell craps out or if you are one of those without a cell phone (you know, every ten years when they let you leave the monastery), and in need to make a call, it’s a good chance that you will most likely need to make a call while in transit. I can remember during the height of commuting time, lines at these pay phones, calling the suburbs and informing the spouse what train you are will be on. The phones now seem a simple decoration, a real old fashioned train station, still reminiscent of the station the Hoboken Hub was modeled on—Victoria Station in London. They still function (For a price) but they are really just adding to the ambience of commuting the old fashioned way, when you could get on a train and not be forced to eavesdrop on the spousal argument that couldn’t wait until the other half got home.

This bank of phones brought back some memories. I commuted through here some in the 80s and I called the girlfriend many a time from here, used to carry a roll of quarters sometimes. The phones are still here but the reasons we used them are long time, even if the memories of those reasons remain… in some.