Area codes 514 and 438

Area codes 514 and 438 are the telephone area codes for Montreal and most of its on-island suburbs. They cover the Island of Montreal, Île Perrot, and Île Bizard in the province of Quebec.

The main area code, 514, was one of the 86 original North American Numbering Plan Areas defined in 1947. 438 is an overlay area code covering the same area. The 514 area code has been split twice; in 1957 to create area code 819 and in 1998 to create area code 450.

The incumbent local exchange carrier (ILEC) for 514/438 is Bell Canada. The competitive local exchange carriers (CLEC's) for 514/438 are Vidéotron, Telus, Rogers, and some independent companies.

Montreal's local calls were originally handled manually by operators; a called party was requested by name before the first (four-digit) local numbers were assigned in July 1881. In 1898, exchange names ("Main", "Westmount", "Uptown" or "East") were added before the number. The initial rotary dial exchange, "LAncaster", was deployed April 25, 1925. Subscribers dialled two letters of an exchange name and four digits (2L+4N), so "LAncaster 1234" became LA-1234 (or 52-1234).

The initial area codes were created in 1947 as routing codes for operator-assisted calls. Québec and Ontario were the only provinces that received multiple area codes. Quebec was split between area codes 514 and 418. 514 originally covered the entire western half of Quebec, from the Canada–US border to the Hudson Strait. This area nominally included several remote areas in the far northern portion of the province which, at the time, didn't have telephone service. The first Bell System direct distance dial call was made in 1951, from Englewood, New Jersey to Alameda, California, using a system based on fixed-length area codes plus seven-digit local numbers. Montreal and Toronto, the largest Canadian cities, were six digits (2L+4N) at the time. Between 1951 and 1958, numbers were lengthened by adding a digit (2L+5N) in preparation for deployment of direct distance dialling. The 514 area code was split in 1957 to create area code 819 for most of western Quebec, from Estrie (Sherbrooke) to the Ontario border, with the then-unserved far northern portion nominally added to 418 (and later moved to 819). 514 was reduced to the region surrounding Montreal.

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