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Show Telephone Co. Switches To Automatic System Edward Schackleford and Baline Barton, Mountain States Telephone Tele-phone and Telegraph Co. central office repairmen are shown making mak-ing a final inspection of crossbar relays used in the new automatic toll switching equipment recently installed to serve Utahns. Utah's new 4-A automatic toll switching equipment, located inj the main telephone building in Salt Lake City, was placed in service Sunday, March 16, according ac-cording to H. K. Richmond, District Dis-trict Manager of the Telephone Company. This marked the completion com-pletion of a five million dollar construction and service improvement im-provement project that began in 1956. It is the second system of its kind to be installed in the Mountain States area. The new equipment is part of a nationwide toll dialing network that makes possible more efficient effi-cient use of long distance circuits and a faster routing of long distance dis-tance calls. Customers will continue con-tinue to place their long distance calls as usual with an operator. It is anticipated that approximately approxi-mately 75 per cent of the 33,000 long distance calls originating in Utah daily will pass through the equipment as well as most of the long distance calls terminating in exchanges throughout Utah. This will provide improved long distance service in the entire in- i termountain area. The new equipment will serve both incoming in-coming and outgoing calls as well as calls routed through Salt Lake City to other communities in Utah and adjacent states. For the past eight months up to 125 telephone technicians have been busy installing the intricate equipment. Approximately 125,-! 000 electrical relays and 38,000 miles of wire were used in inter-1 connecting the various switching units. Twelve additional operator ! switchboard positions have been added in order to provide per sonalized operator assistance required re-quired on calls terminating in Utah exchanges. To assure equal distribution of calls through the equipment, automatic cameras keep a constant con-stant record of the flow of traffic traf-fic over the various long distance circuits. If the cameras show a particular group of circuits to be overloaded an adjustment in the routing of calls is made to obtain a maximum of efficiency. Operators placing calls through the new equipment no longer use the conventional dial. They use a "key pulse unit" that resembles the keys on a small 10 key adding add-ing machine. As the keys are depressed signals are transmitted to the equipment on a musical i tone. The company has learned that with musical tones information informa-tion is transmitted faster, more accurately and over greater distances. dis-tances. The 4-A equipment is a modern electric "brain" designed to obey the slightest command of the operator. It listens for her call, counts the pulses of her dial, remembers the number, examines ex-amines the dial equipment available, avail-able, learns where the call is going, go-ing, decides on ,the best route, tests to see if the route is clear, j selects an alternate if the first route is busy, sets up the connection con-nection to the dialed telephone, and rings the bells. Mr. Richmond said, "only by continued progress in the telephone tele-phone business have we been able to keep pace with the rapid growth and industrial development develop-ment of this area. By installing this modern switching system we are extending an invitation to new industry to come to Utah, and to our present customers an invitation to expand. Our long distance facilities will be adequate ade-quate to meet their future requirements." |
