Around 7,300 defunct phone booths in New York will soon be transformed into a free internet hotspots.
The City of New York announced the plan late last week after two years of questions over the future of old phone boxes around the city.
Once repurposed, the old phone booths will offer people free city services calls, as well as gratisinternet, and will make up one of the largest free Wi-Fi networks in the U.S.
This clever idea was put forward as part of the 2013 the Reinvent Payphones Design Challenge, but the final design still hasn't been decided on, Wired reports.
Instead the city is calling for more public proposals on how the phone booths will ultimately look, and is searching for additional services that could be added to the booths, such as charging stations (YES!) or city information.
In a press release, the City of New York also explains that they want everything to be powered sustainably.
"For years, the question was, 'What to do with payphones?' and now we have an answer," said Mayor Bill de Blasio in the statement.
"By using a historic part of New York's street fabric, we can significantly enhance public availability of increasingly-vital broadband access, invite new and innovative digital services, and increase revenue to the city - all at absolutely no cost to taxpayers."
When you consider all of the unused phone booths around the world at the moment, it's exciting to think of the possibilities.
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