Area code 408
Encyclopedia
North American area code 408 is a telephone
area code in California
that covers most of Santa Clara County and includes Gilroy
, Morgan Hill
, Saratoga
, Los Gatos
, Monte Sereno
, Milpitas
, Sunnyvale
, Santa Clara
, Cupertino
, and San Jose
. It was created in a 1959 split from area code 415
in a flash-cut
with no permissive dialing
period. On July 11, 1998, it was split again, with area code 831
having been created for the counties of Santa Cruz
, Monterey
, and San Benito
.
that were not served by the Bell System
. Gilroy
and Morgan Hill
were also outside the Regional Bell Operating Company
(RBOC) service area. These communities were served by what was referred to, in “Bell System circles”, as “independent” telephone companies.
According to historian Willys I. Peck, the Los Gatos Telephone Company was the first company to offer telephone service in town. Later, the Western California Telephone Company provided service to Los Gatos and to Novato
, Morgan Hill
, and Kenwood
. In the 1970s, the utility was acquired by General Telephone and Electronics
, which changed its name to GTE
, and later became Verizon Communications
. Verizon still serves these four areas.
Los Gatos is served by three central offices. Historically, these were referred to as the Six Office, the Four Office, and the Mountain Office. The first two of these designations come from the historic exchange names when the town converted from manual to dial service. Phone numbers in these two offices were ELgato-6 and ELgato-4 numbers, respectively. As the area migrated to seven-digit numbers, these changed to 356- and 354-numbers. In their earlier life, all numbers for the segment of town served by each office had the respective prefix or office code related to that office.
Previously, billing information for calls placed from Los Gatos was recorded on magnetic tape, and sent to a centralized processing center in Southern California. As the tapes were processed, the charges found their way to subscribers' bills.
Both the Four Office and the Six Office served suburban areas in the town of Los Gatos. In the 1970s, both offices operated Automatic Electric Company
No. 1EAX switches. Local community folklore describes the public perception of poor service in the area at that time, and suggest the switches would fail catastrophically from time to time. In the mid-1980s, local newspapers reported GTE upgraded the local switches to Automatic Electric GTD5 equipment. News accounts say this was done to roll-out new services which were offered in the surrounding RBOC area but could not be supported by the Automatic Electric No. 1EAX. The reliability of service was improved overnight and now matches surrounding areas.
The Mountain Office served the Summit Road community and areas of the Santa Cruz Mountains west of town. Although the office code or prefix for service from this switch was ELgato-3 (later 353), it was not referred to as the Three Office. During the 1970s and early 1980s, the area was served by Automatic Electric step-by-step (SXS) electromechanical switching equipment. The step office was a maintenance headache and its location in a rural area made the problem more challenging. Users noticed crosstalk, and dial pulsing was audible during at least some of their calls. Outside plant in the Mountain area was subject to a variety of tough environmental factors, including long loop lengths and the high humidity of the Redwood Forest. The area is now served by remote equipment on Summit Road connected to the central office located on Los Gatos Blvd.
Before the late 1980s and the arrival of cellular
and PCS
mobile phone
service, GTE offered Improved Mobile Telephone Service
(IMTS) on VHF (152 MHz) and UHF (454 MHz) frequencies in Los Gatos. The service included full-duplex dial service. There were tight restrictions on call lengths because there were only a few channels available. In the late 1970s, daytime calls longer than three minutes were billed at over $1 per minute to discourage the long-winded. The VHF equipment was located near La Rinconada WTP on More Avenue at NAD27 coordinates 37°15′22"N 121°58′59"W. The IMTS system included General Electric mobile radio voting equipment. (Voting is a form of diversity combining
used in mobile radio systems on land.) One receiver for at least one of the voted IMTS channels was located in a pole mount-cabinet on a utility pole along Montevina Road off California State Route 17. These IMTS systems were dismantled after cellular systems became available to subscribers in the Bay Area.
.
in 1949, San Jose telephone numbers started with names including ALpine-, ANdrews-, BAldwin-, CLayburn-, and CYpress-. As the North American Dialing Plan evolved in the 1950s, these became today's 25x-, 26x-, 22x-, 258-, and 29x-numbers, respectively.
When area codes were introduced in 1947 San Jose was assigned to area code 415 along with the rest of the San Francisco Bay Area
and much of northern California
. Area code 408 was created on January 1, 1959 and included most of Santa Clara
, Santa Cruz
, Monterey
and San Benito
Counties. Until the late 1970s, there was permissive dialing between (408) and (415). At the time, the entire East Bay, peninsula, and on to Marin County
was in area code (415). Phone numbers were not duplicated across (415) and (408), so subscribers could dial seven-digit San Francisco
or Berkeley
numbers without dialing an area code and the call would go through. Population growth, facsimile machines, and pagers caused demands for numbers to outrun the capacity of this permissive dialing plan. The additional demands for PCS and cellular phone numbers helped necessitate the (831)/(408) area code split, the (650)/(415) split, and the earlier (510)/(415) split.
Part of the previous permissive dialing plan included a mass calling prefix for radio station contests, introduced in the 1960s because some contests put unacceptable loads on the Bay Area's telephone switches. Until the 1980s, radio station call-in contests throughout the Bay Area used 575-numbers. Electromechanical switching equipment of the day had been engineered to accommodate large call volumes to 575-numbers. Large numbers of calls would otherwise have overloaded switching equipment causing slow dial tone and blocked long distance circuits.
A patchwork quilt of electromechanical switching equipment handled San Jose calls between 1949 and the 1980s. There were about eight Western Electric Crossbar switches, at least one Number 1 and mostly Number 5. There was a Western Electric 4A Crossbar that took up two floors of the Main telephone exchange
. In the mid 1980s, the 4A crossbar was replaced with a digital switch which took up part of a single floor and quadrupled calling capacity.
The 408 area code was the last area code in the United States to institute the requirement of dialing "1" before making a long-distance call.
(IMTS) was offered. As of 1983, three VHF and two UHF channels were available. Subscribers had either a VHF or UHF vehicle-mounted phone, consequently they could access only two or three channels over the entire San Jose area. (On VHF, the maximum system capacity for the San Jose system was three simultaneous calls.) There was a roaming feature but no registration scheme like the ones used by modern PCS and cell phones.
Seven Trees
, Sunnyvale
, Sunol-Midtown
, Sveadal
More information is found on the California Public Utilities Commission 408 Area Code page, where public feedback is being solicited.
Telephone
The telephone , colloquially referred to as a phone, is a telecommunications device that transmits and receives sounds, usually the human voice. Telephones are a point-to-point communication system whose most basic function is to allow two people separated by large distances to talk to each other...
area code in California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
that covers most of Santa Clara County and includes Gilroy
Gilroy
- People :* Beryl Gilroy* Dan Gilroy* Frank D. Gilroy* Freddie Gilroy* Henry Gilroy* Ian Gilroy* Jackie Gilroy* John Gilroy * Keith Gilroy* Linda Gilroy* Matt Gilroy* Norman Thomas Gilroy* Pat Gilroy* Paul Gilroy* Rex Gilroy* Thomas F...
, Morgan Hill
Morgan Hill, California
Morgan Hill is a city located in the southern part of Santa Clara County, California, United States. Founded on November 10, 1906, the city was named after Hiram Morgan Hill, a San Franciscan who built a country retreat home there in 1884...
, Saratoga
Saratoga, California
Saratoga is a city in Santa Clara County, California, USA. It is located on the west side of the Santa Clara Valley, directly west of San Jose, in the San Francisco Bay area. The population was 29,926 at the 2010 census....
, Los Gatos
Los Gatos, California
The Town of Los Gatos is an incorporated town in Santa Clara County, California, United States. The population was 29,413 at the 2010 census. It is located in the San Francisco Bay Area at the southwest corner of San Jose in the foothills of the Santa Cruz Mountains...
, Monte Sereno
Monte Sereno, California
Monte Sereno is a city in Santa Clara County, California, USA. The population was 3,341 at the 2010 census. The city is located in the foothills of the Santa Cruz Mountains, about 10 miles southwest of San Jose and is immediately northwest of Los Gatos. The city is named for the 2249 ft...
, Milpitas
Milpitas, California
Milpitas is a city in Santa Clara County, California. It is a suburb of the major city of San Jose, California. It is located with San Jose to its south and Fremont to its north, at the eastern end of State Route 237 and generally between Interstates 680 and 880 which run roughly north/south...
, Sunnyvale
Sunnyvale, California
Sunnyvale is a city in Santa Clara County, California, United States. It is one of the major cities that make up the Silicon Valley located in the San Francisco Bay Area...
, Santa Clara
Santa Clara, California
Santa Clara , founded in 1777 and incorporated in 1852, is a city in Santa Clara County, in the U.S. state of California. The city is the site of the eighth of 21 California missions, Mission Santa Clara de Asís, and was named after the mission. The Mission and Mission Gardens are located on the...
, Cupertino
Cupertino, California
Cupertino is an affluent suburban city in Santa Clara County, California in the U.S., directly west of San Jose on the western edge of the Santa Clara Valley with portions extending into the foothills of the Santa Cruz Mountains. The population was 58,302 at the time of the 2010 census. Forbes...
, and San Jose
San Jose, California
San Jose is the third-largest city in California, the tenth-largest in the U.S., and the county seat of Santa Clara County which is located at the southern end of San Francisco Bay...
. It was created in a 1959 split from area code 415
Area code 415
North American Area code 415 is the Californian telephone area code for San Francisco and its northern suburbs .-History:415 was one of the original three area codes in California, established in 1947...
in a flash-cut
Flash-cut
A flash-cut, also called flash-cutover, is an immediate change in a complex system, with no phase-in period.Some telephone area codes were split immediately, rather than being phased in with a permissive dialing period. An example is telephone area code 213, which was split into 213 and 714 all at...
with no permissive dialing
Permissive dialing
In North America, permissive dialing is the ability to make phone calls in an area subject to a newly introduced area code using both the new and preexisting dialing methods....
period. On July 11, 1998, it was split again, with area code 831
Area code 831
North American area code 831 is a California area code which covers Salinas, Hollister, Monterey, Santa Cruz and the northern Central Coast. It was created in a split from area code 408 on July 11, 1998.-Monterey County:*Aromas*Boronda*Carmel Highlands...
having been created for the counties of Santa Cruz
Santa Cruz County, California
Santa Cruz County is a county located on the Pacific coast of the U.S. state of California, on the California Central Coast. The county forms the northern coast of the Monterey Bay. . As of the 2010 U.S. Census, its population was 262,382. The county seat is Santa Cruz...
, Monterey
Monterey County, California
Monterey County is a county located on the Pacific coast of the U.S. state of California, its northwestern section forming the southern half of Monterey Bay. The northern half of the bay is in Santa Cruz County. As of 2010, the population was 415,057. The county seat and largest city is Salinas...
, and San Benito
San Benito County, California
San Benito County is a county located in the Coast Range Mountains of the U.S. state of California, south of San Jose. As of 2010 the population was 55,269. The county seat is Hollister, which includes nearly two-thirds of the county's population. El Camino Real passes through the county and...
.
Los Gatos
Los Gatos is one of three cities in Santa Clara CountySanta Clara County, California
Santa Clara County is a county located at the southern end of the San Francisco Bay Area in the U.S. state of California. As of 2010 it had a population of 1,781,642. The county seat is San Jose. The highly urbanized Santa Clara Valley within Santa Clara County is also known as Silicon Valley...
that were not served by the Bell System
Bell System
The Bell System was the American Bell Telephone Company and then, subsequently, AT&T led system which provided telephone services to much of the United States and Canada from 1877 to 1984, at various times as a monopoly. In 1984, the company was broken up into separate companies, by a U.S...
. Gilroy
Gilroy, California
Gilroy is the southernmost city in Santa Clara County, California, United States. The population was 48,821 at the 2010 census. Gilroy is well-known for its garlic crop and for the annual Gilroy Garlic Festival, featuring various garlicky foods, including garlic ice cream. Gilroy also produces...
and Morgan Hill
Morgan Hill, California
Morgan Hill is a city located in the southern part of Santa Clara County, California, United States. Founded on November 10, 1906, the city was named after Hiram Morgan Hill, a San Franciscan who built a country retreat home there in 1884...
were also outside the Regional Bell Operating Company
Regional Bell Operating Company
The Regional Bell Operating Companies are the result of United States v. AT&T, the U.S. Department of Justice antitrust suit against the former American Telephone & Telegraph Company . On January 8, 1982, AT&T Corp. settled the suit and agreed to divest its local exchange service operating...
(RBOC) service area. These communities were served by what was referred to, in “Bell System circles”, as “independent” telephone companies.
According to historian Willys I. Peck, the Los Gatos Telephone Company was the first company to offer telephone service in town. Later, the Western California Telephone Company provided service to Los Gatos and to Novato
Novato, California
Novato is a city located in the North Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, in northern Marin County. Novato is located about north-northwest of San Rafael, at an elevation of 30 feet above sea level . The 2010 U.S. Census estimated the city population to be about 51,904. Novato is about ...
, Morgan Hill
Morgan Hill, California
Morgan Hill is a city located in the southern part of Santa Clara County, California, United States. Founded on November 10, 1906, the city was named after Hiram Morgan Hill, a San Franciscan who built a country retreat home there in 1884...
, and Kenwood
Kenwood, California
Kenwood, California is an unincorporated town and census-designated place in Sonoma County, California, United States, located on Sonoma Highway between the cities Santa Rosa and Sonoma. It lies east of Sonoma Creek in the upper part of Sonoma Valley, a region sometimes called the Valley of the...
. In the 1970s, the utility was acquired by General Telephone and Electronics
GTE
GTE Corporation, formerly General Telephone & Electronics Corporation was the largest independent telephone company in the United States during the days of the Bell System....
, which changed its name to GTE
GTE
GTE Corporation, formerly General Telephone & Electronics Corporation was the largest independent telephone company in the United States during the days of the Bell System....
, and later became Verizon Communications
Verizon Communications
Verizon Communications Inc. is a global broadband and telecommunications company and a component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average...
. Verizon still serves these four areas.
Los Gatos is served by three central offices. Historically, these were referred to as the Six Office, the Four Office, and the Mountain Office. The first two of these designations come from the historic exchange names when the town converted from manual to dial service. Phone numbers in these two offices were ELgato-6 and ELgato-4 numbers, respectively. As the area migrated to seven-digit numbers, these changed to 356- and 354-numbers. In their earlier life, all numbers for the segment of town served by each office had the respective prefix or office code related to that office.
Previously, billing information for calls placed from Los Gatos was recorded on magnetic tape, and sent to a centralized processing center in Southern California. As the tapes were processed, the charges found their way to subscribers' bills.
Both the Four Office and the Six Office served suburban areas in the town of Los Gatos. In the 1970s, both offices operated Automatic Electric Company
Automatic Electric Company
Automatic Electric Company was a telephone equipment supplier for independent telephone companies, comparable to the Bell System's Western Electric. It was located in Northlake, Illinois, with research and development labs in Melrose Park and Elmhurst, Illinois...
No. 1EAX switches. Local community folklore describes the public perception of poor service in the area at that time, and suggest the switches would fail catastrophically from time to time. In the mid-1980s, local newspapers reported GTE upgraded the local switches to Automatic Electric GTD5 equipment. News accounts say this was done to roll-out new services which were offered in the surrounding RBOC area but could not be supported by the Automatic Electric No. 1EAX. The reliability of service was improved overnight and now matches surrounding areas.
The Mountain Office served the Summit Road community and areas of the Santa Cruz Mountains west of town. Although the office code or prefix for service from this switch was ELgato-3 (later 353), it was not referred to as the Three Office. During the 1970s and early 1980s, the area was served by Automatic Electric step-by-step (SXS) electromechanical switching equipment. The step office was a maintenance headache and its location in a rural area made the problem more challenging. Users noticed crosstalk, and dial pulsing was audible during at least some of their calls. Outside plant in the Mountain area was subject to a variety of tough environmental factors, including long loop lengths and the high humidity of the Redwood Forest. The area is now served by remote equipment on Summit Road connected to the central office located on Los Gatos Blvd.
Before the late 1980s and the arrival of cellular
Cellular frequencies
All cellular phone networks worldwide use a portion of the radio frequency spectrum designated as ultra high frequency, or "UHF", for the transmission and reception of their signals. The ultra high frequency band is also shared with television, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth transmission...
and PCS
Personal Communications Service
At the most basic level Personal Communications Service or PCS describes a set of wireless communications capabilities that allows some combination of terminal mobility, personal mobility, and service profile management...
mobile phone
Mobile phone
A mobile phone is a device which can make and receive telephone calls over a radio link whilst moving around a wide geographic area. It does so by connecting to a cellular network provided by a mobile network operator...
service, GTE offered Improved Mobile Telephone Service
Improved Mobile Telephone Service
The Improved Mobile Telephone Service is a "0G" pre-cellular VHF/UHF radio system that links to the PSTN. IMTS was the radiotelephone equivalent of land dial phone service...
(IMTS) on VHF (152 MHz) and UHF (454 MHz) frequencies in Los Gatos. The service included full-duplex dial service. There were tight restrictions on call lengths because there were only a few channels available. In the late 1970s, daytime calls longer than three minutes were billed at over $1 per minute to discourage the long-winded. The VHF equipment was located near La Rinconada WTP on More Avenue at NAD27 coordinates 37°15′22"N 121°58′59"W. The IMTS system included General Electric mobile radio voting equipment. (Voting is a form of diversity combining
Diversity combining
Diversity combining is the technique applied to combine the multiple received signals of a diversity reception device into a single improved signal.- Various techniques :Various diversity combining techniques can be distinguished:...
used in mobile radio systems on land.) One receiver for at least one of the voted IMTS channels was located in a pole mount-cabinet on a utility pole along Montevina Road off California State Route 17. These IMTS systems were dismantled after cellular systems became available to subscribers in the Bay Area.
Manual service
Before 1949, San Jose telephones were manual service. A subscriber would lift the receiver and wait for the operator to inquire, "Number Please?" Most telephone numbers started with Ballard or Columbia. Mayfair numbers served the east side. The City Manager's number was Ballard 1 while most numbers had four digits and a letter, (for example: Ballard 2345 W). One of four letters was appended to telephone numbers: J, M, R, or W. These letters may have tipped off the operator as to the proper keys to press to ring a subscriber who was on a party lineParty line (telephony)
In twentieth-century telephone systems, a party line is an arrangement in which two or more customers are connected directly to the same local loop. Prior to World War II in the United States, party lines were the primary way residential subscribers acquired local telephone service...
.
Dial service and numbering plan
After the conversion to dial serviceTelephone exchange
In the field of telecommunications, a telephone exchange or telephone switch is a system of electronic components that connects telephone calls...
in 1949, San Jose telephone numbers started with names including ALpine-, ANdrews-, BAldwin-, CLayburn-, and CYpress-. As the North American Dialing Plan evolved in the 1950s, these became today's 25x-, 26x-, 22x-, 258-, and 29x-numbers, respectively.
When area codes were introduced in 1947 San Jose was assigned to area code 415 along with the rest of the San Francisco Bay Area
San Francisco Bay Area
The San Francisco Bay Area, commonly known as the Bay Area, is a populated region that surrounds the San Francisco and San Pablo estuaries in Northern California. The region encompasses metropolitan areas of San Francisco, Oakland, and San Jose, along with smaller urban and rural areas...
and much of northern California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
. Area code 408 was created on January 1, 1959 and included most of Santa Clara
Santa Clara County, California
Santa Clara County is a county located at the southern end of the San Francisco Bay Area in the U.S. state of California. As of 2010 it had a population of 1,781,642. The county seat is San Jose. The highly urbanized Santa Clara Valley within Santa Clara County is also known as Silicon Valley...
, Santa Cruz
Santa Cruz County, California
Santa Cruz County is a county located on the Pacific coast of the U.S. state of California, on the California Central Coast. The county forms the northern coast of the Monterey Bay. . As of the 2010 U.S. Census, its population was 262,382. The county seat is Santa Cruz...
, Monterey
Monterey County, California
Monterey County is a county located on the Pacific coast of the U.S. state of California, its northwestern section forming the southern half of Monterey Bay. The northern half of the bay is in Santa Cruz County. As of 2010, the population was 415,057. The county seat and largest city is Salinas...
and San Benito
San Benito County, California
San Benito County is a county located in the Coast Range Mountains of the U.S. state of California, south of San Jose. As of 2010 the population was 55,269. The county seat is Hollister, which includes nearly two-thirds of the county's population. El Camino Real passes through the county and...
Counties. Until the late 1970s, there was permissive dialing between (408) and (415). At the time, the entire East Bay, peninsula, and on to Marin County
Marin County, California
Marin County is a county located in the North San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California, across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco. As of 2010, the population was 252,409. The county seat is San Rafael and the largest employer is the county government. Marin County is well...
was in area code (415). Phone numbers were not duplicated across (415) and (408), so subscribers could dial seven-digit San Francisco
San Francisco, California
San Francisco , officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the financial, cultural, and transportation center of the San Francisco Bay Area, a region of 7.15 million people which includes San Jose and Oakland...
or Berkeley
Berkeley, California
Berkeley is a city on the east shore of the San Francisco Bay in Northern California, United States. Its neighbors to the south are the cities of Oakland and Emeryville. To the north is the city of Albany and the unincorporated community of Kensington...
numbers without dialing an area code and the call would go through. Population growth, facsimile machines, and pagers caused demands for numbers to outrun the capacity of this permissive dialing plan. The additional demands for PCS and cellular phone numbers helped necessitate the (831)/(408) area code split, the (650)/(415) split, and the earlier (510)/(415) split.
Part of the previous permissive dialing plan included a mass calling prefix for radio station contests, introduced in the 1960s because some contests put unacceptable loads on the Bay Area's telephone switches. Until the 1980s, radio station call-in contests throughout the Bay Area used 575-numbers. Electromechanical switching equipment of the day had been engineered to accommodate large call volumes to 575-numbers. Large numbers of calls would otherwise have overloaded switching equipment causing slow dial tone and blocked long distance circuits.
A patchwork quilt of electromechanical switching equipment handled San Jose calls between 1949 and the 1980s. There were about eight Western Electric Crossbar switches, at least one Number 1 and mostly Number 5. There was a Western Electric 4A Crossbar that took up two floors of the Main telephone exchange
Telephone exchange
In the field of telecommunications, a telephone exchange or telephone switch is a system of electronic components that connects telephone calls...
. In the mid 1980s, the 4A crossbar was replaced with a digital switch which took up part of a single floor and quadrupled calling capacity.
The 408 area code was the last area code in the United States to institute the requirement of dialing "1" before making a long-distance call.
Mobile service
Before the existence of cell phones, Improved Mobile Telephone ServiceImproved Mobile Telephone Service
The Improved Mobile Telephone Service is a "0G" pre-cellular VHF/UHF radio system that links to the PSTN. IMTS was the radiotelephone equivalent of land dial phone service...
(IMTS) was offered. As of 1983, three VHF and two UHF channels were available. Subscribers had either a VHF or UHF vehicle-mounted phone, consequently they could access only two or three channels over the entire San Jose area. (On VHF, the maximum system capacity for the San Jose system was three simultaneous calls.) There was a roaming feature but no registration scheme like the ones used by modern PCS and cell phones.
Seven Trees
Seven Trees, California
Seven Trees was a census-designated place in South San Jose and it was previously an unincorporated pocket in Santa Clara County, California, completely surrounded by San Jose...
, Sunnyvale
Sunnyvale, California
Sunnyvale is a city in Santa Clara County, California, United States. It is one of the major cities that make up the Silicon Valley located in the San Francisco Bay Area...
, Sunol-Midtown
Sunol-Midtown, California
Midtown was a census-designated place and primarily residential area in Santa Clara County, California, United States. It has been annexed to San Jose...
, Sveadal
Sveadal, California
Sveadal is a private Swedish American community in unincorporated Santa Clara County, California. It is located near Morgan Hill, California in the eastern Santa Cruz Mountains, adjacent to Uvas Canyon County Park. It has been owned by the Swedish American Patriotic League since its founding in 1926...
Proposed changes to area code 408
Since the 408 area code is close to being exhausted, a new area code will be necessary in the region. The 408 area code is forecasted to require a new area code, confirmed to be area code 669, by the second quarter of 2012. Two relief options have been considered:- A 408/669 overlay, which has been recommended, which would be the first overlay in northern CaliforniaNorthern CaliforniaNorthern California is the northern portion of the U.S. state of California. The San Francisco Bay Area , and Sacramento as well as its metropolitan area are the main population centers...
- A 408/669 split, with either the western region (from downtown San JoseDowntown San JoseDowntown San Jose is the central business district of San Jose, California, United States. The area is generally located north of Interstate 280 and east of Guadalupe Parkway, which roughly parallels the Guadalupe River. The region is bound to the north by U.S...
south and west) or the eastern region (an arc from SunnyvaleSunnyvale, CaliforniaSunnyvale is a city in Santa Clara County, California, United States. It is one of the major cities that make up the Silicon Valley located in the San Francisco Bay Area...
to GilroyGilroy, CaliforniaGilroy is the southernmost city in Santa Clara County, California, United States. The population was 48,821 at the 2010 census. Gilroy is well-known for its garlic crop and for the annual Gilroy Garlic Festival, featuring various garlicky foods, including garlic ice cream. Gilroy also produces...
north and east of downtown San Jose) changing to 669 - On October 20, 2011 the CPC approved implementing 669 as an overlay to the existing 408 area code
More information is found on the California Public Utilities Commission 408 Area Code page, where public feedback is being solicited.