Area Codes

State utility officials voted Thursday to overlay a new area code in the San Fernando Valley -- an action that follows a decade of emotional debate and effectively ends the Valley's longtime reputation as the land of the 818. The decision by the California Public Utilities Commission will also add a new area code to a number of communities north of San Diego. Beginning in May 2009, all new telephone numbers issued in the 818 area will take a 747 area code.

Running short of numbers, state regulators are proposing a new area code for Orange County or even adding an overlay zone in which neighbors could end up in different area codes. State officials say the supply of 714 area code phone numbers will be exhausted sometime in 2008. The 714 area code -- which serves northern and western Orange County -- was created in 1951 after it was split from the 213 zone. The proposed 657 area code would be Orange County's fourth.

LIKE body fat percentages and box office grosses, area codes are one more metric by which Southern Californians define themselves. The broad stereotypes (and are there any other kinds when you're lumping millions of people together?) include the old-school, loft-dwelling 213; the knit-cap-wearing, hipster-vegan 323; the moneyed, three-picture-deal 310; and the oft-maligned, suburban punch line of the 818. Which brings us to the 424.

818. For more than two decades, those three numbers have served as a point of pride for San Fernando Valley residents and occasionally used with derision by people on the other side of the Hollywood Hills. The question now is whether 747 has the same ring. State regulators said Thursday that they intend to create a new area code for the San Fernando Valley by either assigning all new phone customers to the 747 area code or dividing the 818 in two.

State regulators decided Thursday to create an area code overlay in the 714 section of Orange County, establishing the second such blended telephone zone in California. The California Public Utilities Commission's 5-0 vote means that, starting late next summer, callers in the current 714 area will need to dial 10 or 11 digits to complete a local call. Existing telephone customers adding new numbers might wind up with phones in different area codes.

Krysten Robertson is in area-code denial -- and she's not alone. The Santa Monica resident's personal and professional life are centered in the 310 area code. Like others who call the Westside and South Bay home, she has little more than two weeks before callers are required to dial 1 plus the area code before a number, even for calls within the 310 boundaries. For Robertson, 28, that means reprogramming scores of numbers on her cellphone and work line.

Residents of the 310, get your fingers ready. Starting today, everyone who lives within the boundaries of the 310 area code will have to dial 11 digits -- 1 plus 310, then the seven-digit number -- when making a local call. The new dialing procedure is another step toward implementation of the state's first area code overlay. Service providers are scheduled to begin distributing numbers with the new 424 code Aug. 26. Existing customers will keep their 310 numbers.

A renewed request by phone companies to create a second area code in the 310 area prompted a letter, sent Monday, arguing against the change from three lawmakers to the state Public Utilities Commission. The proposal would require people in the 310 area to use 10-digit dialing, according to the letter from Assemblyman Mike Gordon (D-El Segundo), Rep. Jane Harman (D-Venice) and county Supervisor Don Knabe.

The state Public Utilities Commission will hold public hearings today and Wednesday to gauge reaction to a proposal for a new "overlay" telephone code in the Westside and South Bay areas now served exclusively by the 310 area code. Officials say that growing telephone use -- especially cellphone use -- means that the 310 area code is rapidly running out of available numbers. The commission probably will have to decide what to do within another year or two.

To some people on the Westside and in the South Bay, 310 is more than just an area code. It's a geographic marker -- one that many associate with wealth, glamour and the beach. "It stirs up feeling of 'Ah, Ooh.' You always have great expectations," said Larry Steele, who with his partners recently christened their new Santa Monica restaurant 310 Lounge & Bistro. "It's a hot name." It may soon be an unavailable name.