Wire Center

The physical structure where the telephone company terminates subscriber outside cable plant (i.e. their local lines) with the necessary testing facilities to maintain them. Usually the same location as a class 5 central office. One or more Switching Entities which serve the plant facilities through a single main frame (or two or more main frames joined by the cables), regardless of the number of buildings involved. A wire center might have one or several class 5 central offices, also called public exchanges or simply switches. A customer could get telephone service from one, several or all of these switches without paying extra. They would all be his local switch.