Payphone Radio is an online radio stream comprising hundreds of calls made
from New York City public pay telephones. Most of the audio is spoken
commentary by Mark Thomas, but other sounds float through as well.
Other audio includes some of the pre-recorded messages heard when calling
disconnected payphones. There are also sounds of musicians performing in
the New York City subway system, recorded using nearby subway payphones.
Virtually all of New York Citys payphones are gone. On account of that
inevitable reality Payphone Radio, containing 1600 calls and over 63 hours
of content recorded from 2010 until the pandemic struck in 2020, is not
expected to update with new content.
This project had many aims but keeping the grey, monochrome, sometimes
poor-quality sound world of the public pay telephone alive for posterity
was high among them.
Payphone Radio is a spinoff of The Payphone Project, the Internets
original payphone website, online since 1995. The Payphone Project has
been featured by The New York Times, CBS Sunday Morning, LA
Times and numerous other media outlets.