After nearly four decades, the 75th Communications and Information Directorate is officially shutting down its analog telephone switch, marking a complete transition to digital.

“It’s been a big undertaking and required a lot of work,” said Jeff Coulter, installation telecommunications lead. “We’ve been working on this transition for several years, and it’s finally finished.”

Installed in 1985, the analog switch – known as the Public Base Exchange – was a massive operation. Serving the base’s needs took a full room, approximately 30,000 miles of ground cable, and a team of 40 employees. Today, advanced technology allows the same phone services to be managed by just three people, with only two racks of equipment.

The shift to VoIP (voice over internet protocol) actually began nearly 20 years ago, according to Coulter. However, the project faced delays due to limited resources and other hurdles. There are around 800 phones that still rely on analog lines due to internet constraints, but over 15,500 base phones have now switched to VoIP and can be managed remotely.

Coulter, along with his colleagues Burke Kilburn and Phillip Gardner, who helped see the project to completion, is pleased to reach the end but admits to a sense of melancholy for the analog system and how well it served the base needs for nearly 40 years. 

“It’s strange to look back on what it used to take to provide the base phone service,” he said. “Over the years, there has been a steady rotation of military members and civilians who spent their whole careers working on the old telephone switch.” λ